Bulgarian Mayor Calls Off Electoral Campaign over Ethnic Tensions

Pictured: riot police are repulsing violent protesters in downtown Sofia Monday night. Photo by Sofia Photo Agency

In an unprecedented move, Slavcho Atanasov, incumbent Mayor of Bulgaria's second largest city of Plovdiv, has declared he officially stops his campaign to get reelected in the aftermath of the Bulgarian-Roma tensions that erupted in the region.

After a Bulgarian boy was supposedly murdered by a member of notorious crime boss Kiril Rashkov's Roma clan in the southern village of Katunitsa near Plovdiv on Friday, protests loomed in the village and subsequently spread across the country.

As a result, Atanasov has decided not to continue his electoral campaign, since he believes political campaigning could worsen the situation. In a media statement, the incumbent Mayor has also asked his opponents to follow his example.

Those responsible for the murder that stirred the ethnic tensions should be immediately apprehended by police authorities, Atanasov has further said, adding that Rashkov should be investigated.

"What is happening concerns not only Katunitsa, it is a problem of the Bulgarian society as a whole," the Mayor has pointed out.

More than 100 people in total were arrested by the police in a number of Bulgarian cities after a wave of small-scale but vigorous rallies Monday night.

The protesters rallied against 19-year-old Bulgarian boy Angel Petrov's murder by a Roma clan member in Katunitsa, but also because of the "Roma issue", i.e. what they see as a "privileged situation" of the Roma minority in Bulgaria.

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