The Security Information Service (BIS) is an intelligence institution of the Czech state that operates within its territory.[1] It was established on 30 July 1994.[2]
Position and activities
The service is directed and supervised by the Government of the Czech Republic, and its operation is governed by Act No. 154/1994 Coll. on the Security Information Service. The areas it deals with are defined by Act No. 153/1994 Coll. on the intelligence services of the Czech Republic.[1]
BIS is a security corps. Its members are in service relationships, hold service ranks and rank insignia, and may keep and carry a service weapon. They may use it only in cases of necessary defence and extreme necessity, like any other citizen.[1]
It passes the information it obtains to the President of the Republic, the government (the prime minister and individual ministers) and state and police bodies. By its own statement, the service has no repressive powers, that is, it cannot detain, arrest or interrogate, and in its work it respects human rights and freedoms. Where it has to interfere with them, this is done under the rules set by law.[1] The service is financed from taxes.[1]
Origins
After the dissolution of the State Security (Státní bezpečnost) on 15 February 1990, the new democracy faced the task of building intelligence services. According to BIS, it was decided to build them from scratch and not to rebuild the existing structures, so that they would serve the principles of democracy and the rule of law and respect human rights.[2] Constructing a domestic intelligence service in the place of the State Security was particularly difficult. There were fears that the new service would again turn into a secret political police, and there was no ready model that could be transferred from other countries; the experience of the free world was used, adapted to domestic conditions.[2]
The path to today's service led through four organizations:[2]
Úřad pro ochranu ústavy a demokracie Federálního ministerstva vnitra, from 16 February to 19 December 1990; Federální informační služba FMV, from 20 December 1990 to 30 June 1991; Federální bezpečnostní informační služba, from 1 July 1991 to 31 December 1992; Bezpečnostní informační služba České republiky, from 1 January 1993 to 29 July 1994.[2]
According to BIS, the early period of the service was accompanied by various affairs. According to its history, the origin was also affected by the attitude of politicians and government officials, who were often reserved to dismissive, and the service, according to the text, received few tasks. BIS explains this attitude by the international political climate after the fall of the Soviet empire.[2]