The head of German Chancellor Friedrich Merz's office, Thorsten Frei, has advocated a major strengthening of foreign intelligence capacities and a revision of the country's National Security Strategy, which is only two years old.
It is "urgently necessary" to give the Federal Intelligence Service (BND) the financial, technical and legal means to respond to the new threat situation, said Frei, a member of Merz's conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU).
"This is something that will certainly be on our minds in this legislative period," Frei told dpa in comments published on Sunday.
In their coalition agreement, the ruling conservative CDU with its Bavarian sister party the Christian Social Union (CSU) and their junior partner, the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD), agreed to strengthen the domestic intelligence service, called the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, and the Federal Criminal Police Office.
The foreign service, the BND, is not explicitly mentioned in the agreement of the coalition, which took office in May.
However, the legal basis for the work of all intelligence services is to be changed – above all to enable "effective and efficient data exchange" between the services.
As head of the chancellery, Frei is responsible for the BND in the Cabinet.
The National Security Strategy was first presented under the former government of chancellor Olaf Scholz in June 2023 after lengthy consultations.
It replaced the Ministry of Defence's White Paper on Security Policy, which was last reissued in 2016.
Merz had already said during the election campaign that he wanted to present a new national security strategy within a year if he became chancellor. However, this was not reflected in the coalition agreement.
"Such a strategy must also be regularly revised and, above all, must be adapted to changing security policy conditions," Frei told dpa. However, he did not want to commit to a timetable.
- Germany
- Secret
- Service
Source: www.dailyfinland.fi
