Dear
Peter
The
situation is really very simple so far I see it.
There was an argument between one of the members of EB and
Plamen in the EB meeting following the Bilbao Council meeting. Klaus asked me
to investigate it and instructed everyone that nothing more was to be said
until I had reported. My view was that the argument was six of one, half a
dozen of the other and that by the time I reported it would probably just be
forgotten.
However, Plamen went back to the office and emailed Council about
it. Klaus assumed he was still angry and reminded him of the EB decision to
say nothing. Plamen responded with a further email to Council including a
remark that he knew he was going against the President's
instruction.
Klaus and I then drafted a short memorandum which we asked Plamen to
sign saying that he apologised for disobeying EB's instruction, agreeing that
(as it says in his job description) that he would comply with
instructions from the President in the future and finally it bound both
Plamen and EB to keep the whole matter private. We gave Plamen about 5 days to
sign but he did not do so. We then went to Vienna to see him and asked him if
he would now sign but he declined. Instead he proposed that an "amicable
settlement" be negotiated. We made him an offer of 6 months salary and he
asked for a week to respond.
We
went back a week later and after checking that he still wanted to leave IFIP
we started to try to negotiate with him. We repeated our earlier offer and his
response was to ask for what Klaus estimated to be 250,000 euro. We said
that was out of the question (that would be about 4 years salary). When he
refused to negotiate or to give us the undertaking to work in accordance with
his job description, Klaus had no alternative but to terminate his work for
IFIP in accordance with his contract.
Klaus then put the matter into the hands of the Austrian Academy of
Sciences (who formally employ Plamen for IFIP) who are progressing the matter
under Austrian law.
That
is just about the whole story. There is a bit of mud flying round about the
rights and wrongs of the original disagreement with Plamen but that was NOT
the reason Plamen's work was ended nor was it because of an argument with
Klaus who was just a bystander to the argument.
I
hope this helps. It is really a very simple story albeit a sad
one.
Good
wishes
Roger
Roger
I've just come back from the latest IFIP TC6
meeting.
Some time was spent discussing the saga of the IFIP Executive Board
and the IFIP Executive Director.
(A "motion of concern" was agreed, which Augusto Casaca should be
passing on once he gets back to base.)
We saw Klaus Brunnstein's most recent e-mail and had some input from
Dipak Khakhar.
I think there was a feeling, still, among some of the TC6 delegates
that we did not have all the facts.
Is there anything you can add to the story? (Or would you rather
adhere to "least said soonest mended"?)
Regards
Peter
Peter Radford
UK Representative to IFIP Technical
Committee 6
T: +44(0)20 7446 1281
E: Peter.Radford@LogicaCMG.com
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