Has been in custody since the beginning of December.

The Chief of the Defense Intelligence Service in Denmark, Lars Findsen, is remanded in custody, charged with leaking classified information to journalistuh.

This emerged during a court hearing on Monday, where a previous name ban in the case was lifted.

Findsen has led the Defense Intelligence Service (FE) for six years and is according to Denmark’s radio charged with leakage of «highly classified information». He was arrested on December 8 and has been in custody since.

Three other current and former employees of FE and the Danish Surveillance Police (PET) were also arrested and charged in the case. Only Findsen is still in custody.

According to Danmarks Radio, the case concerns the leakage of classified information to the Danish media, but it has not been confirmed which documents or media are in question.

However, the charge falls under the severe serious provision on «treason» in the Danish penal code, which can be punished with up to twelve years in prison. The section has not been in use for 40 years in Denmark.

Monitored

PET has been investigating the case for a long time, and Findsen is said to have been monitored and intercepted.

Over the years, another 57-year-old Findsen, who shortly after the terrorist attacks on the United States in 2001, was appointed leader of PET, has been on several secrets in Denmark.

Seven years later, he became head of department in the Ministry of Defense, before taking over as head of FE in 2015.

Findsen has also had a permanent seat on the Danish government’s security committee for the past 20 years.

Warned editors

The case against the FE boss goes behind closed doors, but the newspaper the policy believes to be able to shed light on the background of the charge against Findsen and the other three.

In December, the PET chief approached Find Borch Andersen and acting FE chief Svend Larsen several Danish editors-in-chief and warned against the consequences of publishing classified information.

Weekendavisen’s editor-in-chief Martin Krasnik told afterwards that three specific issues were mentioned during the meeting. One is about the Dane Ahmed Samsam, who has been convicted of terrorism in Spain, but who according to the newspaper Berlingske has been an agent for Danish intelligence.

Another case concerned Ekstra Bladet’s coverage of the situation for Danish women and children in Syrian prison camps, a case the newspaper on Friday was honored with the highly regarded Cavling Prize for.

NSA cooperation

The third case the two intelligence chiefs warned against digging too deep into was Denmark’s collaboration with the American signal intelligence organization National Security Agency (NSA). This collaboration has been described in detail by several Danish media.

In August 2020, the Authority for the Danish Intelligence Services harshly criticized the FE in connection with the NSA case, and Findsen and four other leaders were removed from the service.

A secret commission has since investigated the accusation that FE led the supervision behind the light and exposed Danes to an unjustified risk of surveillance in connection with its close cooperation with the NSA, writes Politiken.

In all three cases, the Danish media reproduced classified information, and in this connection at least eight were Danish journalistwas taken in from various media last week for questioning by the police.