Denk, PVV furious about secret counter-terrorism reports

The party leaders of Denk and PVV are furious about a series of secret reports from the National Coordinator for Security and Counter-terrorism (NCTV), which qualified them as polarizing political parties. Party leaders Farid Azarkan (Denk) and Geert Wilders (PVV) find it wrong, dangerous, and unacceptable to be dismissed in this way. 

Denk wants to discuss the matter with Justice Minister Dilan Yeşilgöz-Zegerius. Azarkan will also file a complaint. He wants to know what information the NCTV collected, what legal basis it had for this, and who received the collective data. For Azarkan, it is clear that the NCTV broke the law. 

"What sordid smut from the NCTV," PVV leader Wilders said on Twitter. "The PVV has been secretly pushed into the extreme right concern, and thus all PVV members have been wrongly branded as bad. That is terrible and totally unacceptable!"

According to Denk leader Azarkan, former Justice Minister Ferdinand Grapperhauis misinformed parliament last spring. At the time, he said that the information the NCTV collected about political parties was used for their safety. It now appears that the NCTV looked at much more and shared information about parties with Ministries, police, and foreign intelligence services, he said.

The Ministry of Justice denies that parliament was incorrectly informed. The then Minister also reported to parliament last spring that individual MPs were being followed in some parties, a Ministry spokesperson said.

Azarkan sees a dangerous trend in the government in which the police and Tax Authority, among others, are profiling and discriminating ethnically. According to him, the NCTV, which falls under the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice, is just as guilty. "We are dismissed as a party that embraces political Salafism. We participate in the democratic legal order and embrace the Constitution. The framing by the NCTV is extremely dangerous."