DEFENCE Minister Juraj Liška unexpectedly sacked František Kašický, the head of military intelligence, and charged Vladimír Kotrusa with leading the service.
The minister’s spokesman, Zenon Mikle, refused to comment apart from stating that it was in Liška’s authority to recall Kašický.
Robert Kaliňák, the head of the parliamentary defence and security committee, had first expressed worries that Liška sacked Kašický for political reasons.
After consulting with the minister, he said there were exclusively professional reasons behind the recall. Former Defence Minister Ivan Šimko had installed Kašický.
However, members of the parliamentary committee to oversee the activities of the intelligence services were shocked. Unlike Ladislav Pittner, the head of the Slovak Intelligence Service, Kašický was popular even among the opposition.
Šimko suspects that political reasons were behind the change.
