The Council of Ministers has admitted that the CNI spied on the phone of former CUP deputy David Fernández for almost half a year, something the secret services had not acknowledged until now. They have also admitted that the phone of the former parliamentarian of the formation Carles Riera was intercepted for another two years, with authorization from the Supreme Court.
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The Council of Ministers has sent a report that lifts the secrecy of the classified information related to the espionage of both former CUP deputies, at the request of the holder of the Investigative Court number 32 of Barcelona, which is investigating the complaint they filed for infections on their mobile phones with Pegasus uncovered by the Citizen Lab laboratory.
Specifically, the Government informs the court that the CNI, legally and judicially authorized by the Supreme Court judge in charge of controlling the secret services, “intercepted” the communications of both deputies for possible “activities contrary to national security.”
In the case of David Fernández, the espionage lasted nearly a year and a half, between December 18, 2019, and June 2, 2020 – after the procés sentence -, when he had already stopped being a deputy years before but was still linked to the mobilizations of the independence movement and, specifically, to Òmnium Cultural.
Fernández was not on the list of 18 people spied on by the CNI that the former CNI director Paz Esteban, investigated following six complaints filed by those affected by the Pegasus case and who was dismissed as a result of the case, provided in May 2022 to the Congress groups within the framework of a closed-door commission.
The list did include the espionage of Carles Riera, whom the Council of Ministers now admits was subject to telephone interception, also with judicial authorization, between June 23, 2020, and May 24, 2022, a period that partially coincides with his position as a deputy in the Parliament.
On the other hand, the Government denies in its report that the CNI spied on former CUP deputy Albert Botran, despite the technical reports from Citizen Lab also finding traces of Pegasus on his mobile and an expert report from the Mossos d’Esquadra locating an “indicator of compromise” on his phone in December 2019.
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The Catalan police expert report specified, however, that this “indicator of compromise” found on Botran’s mobile did not necessarily imply the “automatic detection” of the malicious Pegasus program, software that the Israeli company NSO primarily markets to States.
In order to carry out a more detailed analysis, the Mossos indicated in their report that they would need to have Botran’s device to extract the information linked to Pegasus, and not just a copy of its content before a notary.
The declassification of secret information by the Council of Ministers expressly enables the director of the CNI, Esperanza Casteleiro, to inform about “the nature” of the activities of Riera and Fernández that motivated the interception of the mobile phones and also allows her to respond about the attack on Botran’s mobile, as there is no record that he was spied on by the CNI.
However, the Government orders the “express concealment” of the fragments of the Supreme Court rulings that authorized the espionage when they allow revealing “the activities, means and procedures and sources of information of the CNI,” which in practice prevents Casteleiro from responding to technical questions related to the use of Pegasus by the secret services.
To the case opened for the espionage of the former CUP deputies, represented by the lawyer and also former parliamentarian of the formation Benet Salellas, are added nine other investigations that are in the hands of different courts in Barcelona about the use of Pegasus on the mobiles of politicians and independence activists.
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