Gov't ousts Interior Ministry Chief of Staff

Anna Bilecova's tenure as the Interior Ministry's chief of staff will terminate on May 10, as the Government approved her ouster at its session on Tuesday. She chose to give up her post because she "refuses to continue serving as a target of public lynching waged against her without any relevant evidence." Some have linked her name with Ladislav Pipta, who faces charges of VAT carousel fraud. Interior Minister Roman Mikulec praised Bilecova's decision to step down, as her name will cease to polarise the public with doubts about her past. In his press release, however, Mikulec underlined that these suspicions haven't been backed by any evidence. It was the SME daily that reported on Bilecova's ties to Ladislav Pipta, who faced multiple criminal prosecutions, at the time when Bilecova served as head of tax audits at the Michalovce tax authority in eastern Slovakia. Transcripts of their wiretapped conversations are listed in the investigation file on the carousel fraud series, in which more than 100 companies were involved between 2007-11, costing the state more than €70 million. Milan Ch., a defendant in the case who chose to co-operate with the authorities, told Czech police that Bilecova allegedly accepted bribes in return for audits that turned a blind eye to the scheme. Bilecova rejected the allegations, and Deputy Interior Minister Lukas Kyselica voiced his support for her as well.