Greek court declares surveillance powers amendment unconstitutional: Human Rights Watch

ATHENS

Greece’s highest administrative court has declared an amendment that prevented an independent body overseeing government surveillance powers from informing citizens of state surveillance due to “national security” reasons unconstitutional, Human Rights Watch said in a report released this week.

The conservative government of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis through a March 2021 amendment removed the ability of the Hellenic Authority for Communication Security and Privacy (ADAE) to inform surveilled citizens even after the monitoring ended.

But on April 5 this year, the Council of State declared that the amendment violated the Greek Constitution, the European Union Charter of Fundamental Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights, the global human rights watchdog said.

“This marks a major victory in Greece’s ongoing surveillance scandal which included revelations that the government surveilled independent journalists, businesspeople, government officials and opposition leader Nikos Androulakis,” said Eva Cosse, senior researcher for Europe at Human Rights Watch.

Androulakis was denied access to his file from the ADAE in September 2022 following the 2021 amendment.​​​​​​​

On Aug. 8, 2022, Mitsotakis acknowledged that Androulakis was wiretapped by Greece’s intelligence agency but denied knowledge of the operation.

The scandal first emerged on Aug. 4 that year when Panagiotis Kontoleon, then-head of the National Intelligence Service (EYP), told a parliamentary committee that the intelligence agency had been spying on financial journalist Thanasis Koukakis.

On Aug. 5, Kontoleon along with the general secretary of the prime minister’s office, Grigoris Dimitriadis, resigned.

A parliamentary probe was launched after Androulakis complained to top prosecutors about an attempt to hack his cellphone with Predator spyware.