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Dutch domestic security service to clean up archives. (1)

01 January 1991

Dutch domestic security service to clean up archives.
artdoc May=1991
Statewatch no.1 March/April 1991

In November 1990 it was announced that about two thirds of the BVD files,
estimated at 200,000 - 600,000, would be destroyed in the following 6 months.
The criteria for the destruction list are to be published, and the State
Archives together with the Institute for Dutch History will supervise the
selection process by way of random checks. A closed congress on these matters
for selected historians was held on 17 January, 1991.
The sudden energy with which the BVD cleans up its cellars is explained by a
forthcoming change in the Archives Law, by which the period after which files
will undergo a mandatory transfer to the State Archives is to be reduced to 20
years. It is expected that this will lead to a greater openness on outdated BVD
materials. A BVD historian, Dr D Engelen, is to write the history of the BVD
during the Cold War. He will be supervised by a commission of mostly social-
democrat professors of history, that will have full access to all BVD files.
This project is to be completed in 4 years.
Meanwhile a group of researchers, journalists, activists and privacy
protectors organized in the "Vereniging Voorkom Vernietiging" (Association
Prevent Destruction) plans a judicial procedure to stop the destruction process.
They claim that a decision with such political impact can not be decided by some
selected scholars and civil servants alone. Also they point to the fact that
other services such as PID's (Special Branches) and military intelligence are
excluded from the operation. Mr. Doctor van Leeuwen, head of the BVD is quoted
as saying that he fears a Swiss situation where, because of a near-total
exposure of archives, the security service is almost out of business.