Allegedly, in 1998 the Romanian Government decided that SIE needed a small anti-terrorist detachment, which could be used in capturing terrorist elements abroad, in cooperation with similar friendly structures from
NATO. Thus, the detachment was created, with members taken mainly from Romania's national anti-terrorist authority, the
Brigada Antiteroristă of the
Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI, Romanian Intelligence Service). The small detachment was composed of only 23 operatives. Over the years, their number was decreased to 15 operatives. The Group's activities are unknown, and the unit was secret until its existence was revealed by the Romanian President
Traian Băsescu in a public speech, where he thanked the Group for taking part in the liberation of the three Romanian journalists held hostage in
Iraq in 2005. This created confusion among the written press in Romania, with some newspapers claiming the operators had actually been from
Brigada Antiteroristă, while others were speaking of an entire "Anti-Terrorist Brigade of SIE". However, Băsescu continued to praise the Group's activity on many occasions, including its alleged cooperation with similar
NATO structures. It is highly unlikely that the President himself, who was the head of the Emergency Response Cell created to deal with the hostage crisis, was confused about the unit's very existence. Therefore, it is logical to assume that this unit truly exists, and that, according to Băsescu and his hostage negotiation team, eight of its fifteen members were present in
Baghdad during the hostage crisis, and managed to free all three hostages and bring them back to Romania. As an additional element to support this assumption, combatants with face-masks were seen disembarking from the
Romanian Air Force C-130 aircraft which brought the hostages back to
Bucharest. ==Notes==