Details emerge of "unprofessional" policing of MTV assault

According to a report on the police action during the assault on the Hungarian Television (MTV) headquarters on September 18, officers acted in a lawful but unprofessional manner, writes hirado.hu. The document is 101 pages long - of which 16 were published on Monday - and was written by a committe led by Pest County Police Chief István Ignácz.

The document points out that insufficient equipment and poor instructions from police chiefs led to the failure of the police to protect the television building and to the injuries to officers.

The water cannon ordered to Szabadság tér was working with at 50% capacity, was not filled with paint and two of the three tear gas bottles it was fitted with were not working. There was no tear gas cannon or rubber bullet gun on the Police Security Service truck and officers had no gask masks. The one-liter tear gas bottles were not working efficiently, the units ordered to secure the building failed to co-operate with each other and orders were unclear and often did not reach officers.

Among further details to emerge were that the first instruction was to send a twelve-member unit to MTV headquarters. They were ordered to leave their sheilds in their vehicle. Baranya County Police team lagged behind the others and got lost. They were unable to find Szabadság tér, while the security service commander was informed about the incident on HírTV.

Meanwhile, the military prosecutor's office has begun proceedings "against an unknown perpetrator for negligence of duty." National Police Chief László Bene is investigating the case under the supervision of prosecutors.

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