Bulgaria's Sandanski Blast Victim Dies in Hospital

Police inspecting the site of the bomb attack in Sandanski. Photo by BGNES

The Bulgarian Roma man, Malin Iliev, who was severely injured in a blast in southern Bulgaria, has died at the Military Medical Academy, VMA, in Sofia Sunday morning.

The powerful blast went off in the wee hours of June 29 in front of the Euroroma Sandanski office. Iliev was listed in the Sandanski hospital in critical condition and with severe trauma and later transported for intensive care in Sofia.

Local Euroroma head Toni Angelov expressed fears that the blast might have been ethnically motivated, but the Blagoevgrad region police commissioner Georgi Kostov refuted such claims, saying the man was passing near the office accidentally. Iliev noticed the package by the door and lifted it, triggering the blast.

Four suspects were arrested just hours after the explosion when police detected traces of the same explosives used in the blast on the suspects' hands.

Bulgarian Interior Minister Tsvetan Tsvetanov insists that, even though the bomb went off in front of the office of the Euroroma political party, there were no political motives behind the criminal act.

The four are being held in permanent detention.

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