The departing Interior Minister Robert Kaliňák (Smer) has said he is still convinced that the alleged attack on Hedviga Malinová is a fiction. He made the comments after the final government session held on July 7.
Malinová, a student, was allegedly beaten up in Nitra in 2006, reportedly after her assailants heard her speaking Hungarian. However, she was later accused by the Interior Ministry of lying about the case.
“I'm convinced that the situation never took place, and all the evidence points to this,” he said, as quoted by the TASR newswire, saying that the evidence he cited had never been questioned.
Alluding to a suggestion made by the incoming interior minister, Daniel Lipšic, that the case has been over-politicised, Kaliňák said that is not the police, but the Office of the General Prosecutor, that has been dealing with the case for the past three-and-a-half years.
He said he did not consider it a mistake to have held a press conference at which he publicly accused Malinová of lying, despite being roundly criticised for doing so. At the press conference, held on September 12, 2006, he announced that, according to the police, the August 2006 attack on Malinová had never happened. The investigator thus stopped the criminal prosecution of the alleged perpetrators.
Kaliňák explained the 2006 press conference by saying he was under pressure and was reacting to the wish of the parliamentary committee as well as international activists to issue a statement. Malinová, now 26 and a mother of two, is still facing charges of perjury and the Office of the General Prosecutor has been unable to close the case.
Source: TASR
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
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