Government Communications Security Bureau staff say the spy agency's involvement in the January raid of the Dotcom mansion was referred to in a briefing given to Prime Minister John Key in February, contradicting repeated comments from Key that the first he knew about the GCSB's involvement in the raid was on September 17 this year.
Megaupload.com founder Kim Dotcom is currently fighting an extradition request by the United States government over copyright infringement charges.
Earlier this year it emerged that the search warrants police used to raid Dotcom's Coatesville mansion were invalid. It also emerged that the GCSB illegally spied on Dotcom, as he was a New Zealand resident. The GCSB is only allowed to spy on foreign nationals. Key is the Minister responsible for the GCSB.
Dotcom had his residency application fast-tracked under the 'investor-plus' immigration scheme after he bought NZ$10 million worth of government bonds. See: Figures show 60% of investments made by would-be residents (including Kim Dotcom) under 'Investor Plus' immigration scheme put into NZ govt bonds
Meanwhile, the GCSB said it had identified three other cases since 2009 where it may have acted outside its legislation. (Read the GCSB's statement here. Incidentally it refers to itself once as the 'GCBS').
Your view?
Here is the release from Key's office:
Prime Minister and Minister Responsible for the Government Communications Security Bureau John Key this morning released the results of a full review of GCSB files conducted by Director Ian Fletcher.
Since 17 September, the date on which Mr Fletcher advised the Prime Minister of the illegal activity in respect of Mr Dotcom, the bureau has been working through its Dotcom-related files in order to cooperate with both the Neazor inquiry and the matters before the High Court.
The Prime Minister said that on Monday, 1 October, he meet with the Director and sought an assurance that the GCSB had reviewed all relevant files.
The Director then conducted a further review of the material and provided it to the Prime Minister’s office last evening. Earlier yesterday afternoon Mr Fletcher met the Prime Minister to discuss his initial findings, which were subsequently confirmed that evening.
The review of the files found the following.
- The Prime Minister was not briefed by the GCSB on its role in the Dotcom matter, nor any issues of potential illegality, until Monday 17 September.
- The Prime Minister was not briefed by any group or official within the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet on the GCSB’s role in the Dotcom matter ahead of the 17 September meeting. Roy Ferguson, Director of the Intelligence Coordination Group, was made aware by GCSB of its role in the arrest of Mr Dotcom the day of the raid but only after it occurred in January 2012. Mr Ferguson has advised the Prime Minister that his records indicate he did not subsequently brief the Prime Minister on the matter. It is not Mr Ferguson’s role to brief the Prime Minister on operational matters.
- The Prime Minister visited GCSB offices on 29 February for a briefing on the broader capabilities of the bureau, and to meet the staff. A paper prepared as talking points for the staff member conducting a presentation contained a short reference to the Dotcom arrest a few weeks earlier, as an example of cooperation between the GCSB and the Police. The presentation was an electronic slide presentation. The cover slide was a montage of 11 small images, one of which was of Mr Dotcom.
- A short briefing note provided to the Prime Minister prior to the 29 February visit contained no reference to the Dotcom matter. The talking points paper was used by the staff member at the briefing, however neither that paper nor a copy of the presentation was provided to the Prime Minister either at that time or subsequently.
- No written record was kept of the meeting.
- In advising the Prime Minister of the talking points note and the electronic presentation, the Director told the Prime Minister that he had no recollection of the Dotcom matter being raised at the meeting but accepted the assurance of his staff that it was mentioned briefly, in the context of a much broader presentation.
- At no point was any reference made to questions about residency status.
The Prime Minister acknowledged the findings of the review and has made them public at the earliest opportunity.
“I have been clear from the outset that I received no briefing on the operation from GCSB prior to 17 September, and this review confirms that,” says Mr Key.
“While neither the GCSB Director nor I can recall the reference to the Dotcom matter being made during my visit to the bureau back in February, I accept that it may well have been made.
“Given the public statements I have made in Parliament and in the media, it is important that I take this opportunity to provide this additional information.
“I will be correcting my answers to the House when it resumes on Tuesday 16 October.”
The Prime Minister today also noted the results of the GCSB audit into all cases of assistance to law enforcement agencies since January 2009. This audit was one of a number of steps ordered by the Prime Minister in the wake of the Dotcom matter, and was released today by the Director.
“The audit finds that in the vast bulk of cases there is no suggestion of any illegality,” says Mr Key.
“In three of 58 cases, however, the GCSB cannot assure me that the legal position is totally clear. More legal work is being undertaken and the GCSB will issue a further public statement when that work has been concluded.”
35 Comments
Spitting hairs, Alex, now you have a second case of technicality becoming the loophole Key slides out on......a greasy little man should be capable of no less.
nor I can recall the reference to the Dotcom matter being made
I cannot recall, said Mr Banks , I cannot recall said Mr. Key
Up yours losers..!...... said the pair in unison.
Time to go PM !
It is a disgrace that this nation has a leader still in power, who regularly lies, shares the responsibility for diminishing ethical and democratic standards and is one of the worst performer in parliament. When a majority of the public mistrust our PM – it is time to step down John Key.
Is it a small wave you've got Midgetkiwi, or a tall wave...? can you rise above your nom to lead us ,or do I need get you one of those kitchen ladder thingys..... ?
If one is not worth fifty million bucks, one must have some imposing qualities, like Big Gerry, an imposing figure indeed,...better than sunblock on a summer day in Canterbury.
Come to think of it bigger than a city block on any given day.
Height isn't everything .......former French President Knickerless Sarkosy is barely 5 foot tall ...... Napolean Bonaparty was less than that ..... and he nearly re-united all of Europe ......if mini-frogs can do it , anyone can ..
...... give MidgetKiwi a fair crack at running GodZone say I !
I think you might be mixing your metaphors a bit there SL.
I think you'll find John Key has what's coming to him, because once you open a can of worms, they always come home to roost. This just could be the nail that broke the coffin's back. He's buttered his bread, now he has to lie in it.
And it's good to see you aren't afraid to call a spade a kettle.
Clearly it's a misunderstanding of recollections explained here:
Sir Humphrey: It is characteristic of all committee discussions and decisions that every member has a vivid recollection of them and that every member’s recollection of them differs violently from every other member’s recollection. Consequently, we accept the convention that the official decisions are those and only those which have been officially recorded in the minutes by the officials, from which it emerges with an elegant inevitability that any decision which has been officially reached will have been officially recorded in the minutes by the officials and any decision which is not recorded in the minutes has not been officially reached even if one or more members believe they can recollect it, so in this particular case, if the decision had been officially reached it would have been officially recorded in the minutes by the officials, and it isn’t so it wasn’t.
Ralph...we are talking about an organisation predisposed to chewing and swallowing evidence...vacuuming DNA particles......covering their tracks.
Let's not forget despite the review there were no heads rolling here....n that smells like trade off to me...something stinks ...stinks real bad...!
There are no minutes recorded........of such a briefing , I would be surprised if there was.
But it's still a technicality....it's still a case of trust me, although he( dot com) was all over the news at the time , I don't recall him coming up in discussion.........really...?...please!
And do you not think this was not going to be a little coup for the G C S B...a little chance to play with the big boys in the FBI, ...they would have been creaming themselves over the matter and falling all over each other to demonstrate to the P.M. their worth as a Bureau....
Come on Matey...,.really do you believe he did not know, or do you support his right to not recall.
A favourite of the Gummster's :
James Hacker : Humphrey , I need help .
Humphrey Appleby : You do .... You do ?
JH : I've got to make a speech . It could be very embarassing .
HA : Oh , Prime Minister ... your speeches are nothing like as embarassing as they used to be .
JH : I didn't say the speech would be embarassing , I said the occassion could .
HA : Ah.... yes , yes ... indeed . Why ?
JH : It's to be to a hostile audience of posturing , self-righteous , theatrical drunks .
HA : The House of Commons , you mean ?
Well I myself have a shocking memory at times. Hardly have any memory of my wedding day at all for example. No really, all jokes aside. So I guess I'm pretty tolerant on others in this department. And in the absence of Bob Jones taking up the job I can't think of a better man for the job at the moment.
Ralph - I agree, I can't remember every damn detail of every damn day. I once forgot to pick my kids up at the school bus stop and they had walked 3km before I remembered them.
I'm not sticking up for the PM but he did attend a briefing on the broader capabilites on how the GCSB operates, it was a demonstration on procedures i.e. not supposedly an actual event, so it wasn't a briefing on the specific event of Dotcom and there is a huge difference.
I reckon it's a bit sneaky to slip something into a demonstration briefing and then say the PM had been briefed. Given the GCSB's illegal activities it is difficult to believe the account they have provided.
Ah the best TV show ever written Ralph.
I also can't help thinking the debacle around Bill English signing the warrant to surpress the GCSB's involvement while Key went overseas was like the 'Rhodesia solution' in the Whiskey Priest episode.
Can't find the transcript, but here's the synopsis:
At the DAA Bernard Woolley comes up with a brilliant idea: the Rhodesia-solution. He advises Jim Hacker to write a very vague letter to the PM that could easily be misinterpreted. The letter should not refer to terrorists or illegal delivery of arms, but only point to the appropriate section in the law. Furthermore, the letter should be delivered at the day the PM is leaving for a foreign meeting, so it will be unclear who got the letter (the PM or the acting PM). So if it comes out the whole thing can be attributed to miscommunication and everyone is in the clear.
http://www.yes-minister.com/ymseas3b.htm
Cheers
Alex
And I can't help myself. Thatcher's Yes Prime Minister sketch. Get rid of all the economists:
And as a fan of the emulsified-high-fat-offal-tube ....
At this point Dotcom will either have to be put away forever (chances seem to be diminshing by the day), or he is going to have to be given back 4% of all internet traffic, plus 40-50 million USD in profits per year his accusers are/were saying he was worth.
How the heck NZ ended up with financial responsibility for this and not the actual accusers is just amazing.
Meanwhile, we are off the list for investment from any budding tech or sunrise new money-type biz around the globe, and Key is betting his/our farm on more involvement from Hollywood, which it can be argued is sunset all day long.
Dotcom = Kryptonite.
IdleB,
All good points. Seems to me it is actually very plausible that Key didn't notice at the time, or had genuinely forgotten, any reference to Dotcom in his GCSB meeting.
But this raid on Dotcom, and the closing down of his business, should pretty clearly never have happened. And it could not have heppened without agreement from our government at close to the very top. Any high profile extradition case, which this was always going to be; would surely get to the Attorney General/ Minister of Justice/ Minister of Police. And if it didn't get to the PM, then that is incompetence. Given the legal debates around online copyright, the case should always have been a civil one first, and his business should not have been closed down until that case went through due process.
And as soon as the case had any questions- pretty much immediately- the government should have been all over it to check for its legal position, and the best way out of a shocking situation. So the fact that Key was uninformed until September about this breach is dereliction of duty.
It sounds liike a $1 billion law suit. NZ's best defence may be if it was not actually the party that turned off the servers (where were they located?) and if what ever was at Coatesville was not integral to the immediate day to day running of Mega upload.
The police (who I'm intuitively a big supporter of) have been made to look like Keystone cops by this apparently wilful incompetence at the top of government.
Stephen L
Answer: Location of Servers: Virginia, USA, with US registered American Domain Names.
Question: Do you consider it pure coincidence that Key, who, having never toured GCSB before, does a tour just before the Dotcom raid, and none since, had not been briefed?.
icon,
Thanks for the info. (which hopefully means the main legal liability sits with the FBI, where it should, given they clearly initiated the whole thing).
I've been, on matters economic, somewhat scathing of Mr Key. So I'm occasionally trying to discipline myself to give him the benefit of the doubt in other areas. But I understand your question. In this case he's either been incompetent, or lying, or both. I was willing to accept just incompetence, but it's a stretch.
It not only thickens but thickens again ,,,
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10838484
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