The Prime Minister and the Minister of Justice are now appearing before a parliamentary inquiry committee in the “mink affair”.”
The Danish Parliament's (House of Representatives) Legal Affairs Committee has been meeting since 9:30 a.m. to question the Prime Minister and the Minister of Justice in the infamous "mink affair." The session is being broadcast live by the media. Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Minister of Justice Nick Hækkerup are required to explain the specific guidelines they follow regarding the storage, access, and backup of deleted emails and text messages.
The prime minister and three senior officials set their phones to automatically delete text messages after 30 days, and as a result, text messages were deleted in the crucial days around September 3 last year when the decision was made to cull mink in Denmark in order to stop the spread of the coronavirus infection that had spread on mink farms, according to authorities at the time.
The case drew sharp criticism from experts and various parties in the Danish parliament.
This is a brief overview of the development of the mink issue:
2021
April 23
The Mink Committee was established
The committee is investigating the process that preceded the government's press conference on November 4, in which Mette Frederiksen said all mink should be killed.
April 29
Request text messages
The committee asked several ministries to provide text messages related to the case that were circulated during the crucial days period.
September 8
Important text messages have been deleted
After 132 days, the Prime Minister responded that text messages had been automatically deleted from the devices of four key people “for security reasons,” including the devices of Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, department head Barbara Bertelsen, another official Martin Juststein, and advisor Bille Pape.
September 13
The committee requested deleted messages.
The committee asked the Prime Minister's office to recover the deleted text messages.
October 27
Mette Frederiksen deleted the text messages
There will be detailed information indicating that in the summer of 2020, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen activated the automatic deletion of her text messages based on the advice of department head Barbara Bertelsen.
October 29
Requesting assistance from the police
The Ministry of Justice has asked the police for help in recovering deleted text messages.
November 17
It cannot be recovered
The Ministry of Justice announced that deleted text messages cannot be recovered.
Source: TV2
