German secret service appoints top official with migration background

Sinan Selen is the new Vice President of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and thus the first top official from Turkish descent within German state security, political magazine Focus reported.

In some circles of the Federal Ministry of the Interior, 46-year-old Selen’s appointment have been met with surprise. The case of Hans-Georg Maaßen in still being hotly debated, they say.

Former German spy chief Maassen was controversially fired and “placed in early retirement” over a speech he gave criticising the current administration over their fake charges of “far-right violence” in the city of Chemnitz.

In a departure speech given to intelligence officials, a leaked copy showed that the ex-spy chief was extremely critical of hard “left wing forces” within the Social Democratic party (SPD). Chancellor Angela Merkel had secured her fourth term in power after the SPD agreed to form another “grand coalition” with her and she possibly took Maaßen’s “insults” personally.

Not only is the new deputy Selen of Turkish descent, but he is someone from the private sector. Selen worked at travel giant TUI. The new Turkish-born boss, a native from Istanbul, had been Head of Group Security at the travel company since June 2016.

It is perplexing to note that within the German security circles there are no personalities who have equal or higher qualifications than Selen, critics noted.

But the leftist daily Tagesspiegel, called Selen a “highly qualified terrorism expert” and added that such an appointment was “long overdue”. But Selen has never stopped a terror attack on German soil.

Selen directed the investigation at the Federal Criminal Investigation Office into a failed attack of a suitcase bomber. Two young Lebanese Islamists put trolleys with explosives in two regional trains on 31 July 2006 in Cologne’s central station. Only because of a technical error did the bombs not explode.

Selen and his colleagues then sifted through images from surveillance cameras that had filmed the perpetrators in the Cologne train station. In August, 2006, the criminal police (BKA) released the pictures from the search, “qualifying Selen for his current position”.

Selen has been Turkey’s point of contact in Berlin for terrorism, the daily reported.