EC Probes Bulgaria's High-profile Criminal Cases

Bulgaria in EU | June 9, 2010, Wednesday // 18:19|  views

Mario Nikolov is charged with money laundering and the draining of millions from the EU pre-accession program for agriculture, SAPARD. Photo by BGNES

A 13-member mission of the European Commission, including one person from the EU anti-fraud office OLAF and 2 independent experts is in Sofia to investigate Bulgaria's high-profile court cases.

The mission arrived Monday and will stay in the country until the end of the week with scheduled meeting with the Prosecutor's Office, representatives of the Court, the Supreme Judicial Council, (VSS), the State Agency for National Security, (DANS), the Interior Ministry, the Unit for Combating Organized Crime (GDBOP), and others.

The mission began Monday at the Justice Ministry with a meeting with Minister, Margarita Popova, and talks about the judicial system reform, the new Penal Code, the Act for Seizing Property Acquired through Criminal Activities, and the Act for Conflict of Interests.

On Tuesday, the experts checked the prosecutor's teams dealing with cases for the draining of SAPARD funds, particularly the one against Mario Nikolov, the case against the former Director of the Refugee Agency, Svetoslav Michev, against alleged top crime boss, Zlatomir Ivanov aka Baretata (The Barret), former Members of the Parliament from the ethnic Turkish party Movement for Rights and Freedoms (DPS), Gyunay Sefer and Mithad Tabakov, among others.

The team visited the Sofia City Court Wednesday to discuss the condition of the facility, its structure, and capacity along with concrete cases. They also met with Chief Prosecutor, Boris Velchev, and his Deputy, Galina Toneva, to learn about the judicial system reform. The experts inquired again about Mario Nikolov's case, the case against the former employees of the Road Agency, Lyubomir Lilov and Ivan Vladimirov, and the one against, Krasimir and Nikolay Marinovi aka The Marguin Brothers.

While in the court building, the EC experts visited in person the trial proceedings against Mario Nikolov and his wife Mariana. Nikolov broke into tears before them saying “after all the scum and slander I had been subject to, no one, until now, took the time to understand what exactly this case is about.”

The defendants in another high-profile case – against The Marguin Brothers also spoke in the presence of the EC team in the courtroom. Stefan Angelov and Biser Iliev, along with the Marguins, are charged with plotting three murders. They stated they were pressured in 2005 by the then City Prosecutor, and now Deputy Chief Prosecutor, Andrey Tsvetanov, and the current City Prosecutor, Nikolay Kokinov, to testify against The Marguins in exchange for their freedom.

After nearly five years of numerous postponements, the case against Marinovi and their co-defendants, ended Wednesday. Starting Thursday, the defense council and the prosecutors will deliver their closing statements.

The EC team will meet later Wednesday with Interior Minister, Tsvetan Tsvetanov.

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Tags: justice reform, Baretata, Marguins, Mario Nikolov, OLAF, EU funds, EU funds abuse, SAPARD

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