Bulgaria's GERB Alarms EU about Ethnic Turkish Vote Buying

Yordan Tsonev, is an economist, MP, and Deputy Chair of the ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms (DPS) party, photo by Sofia Photo Agency

Bulgaria's formerly-ruling, centrist GERB Party will refer to the Chief Prosecutor, CEC, OSCE, PASE, the EC, the EP, and the three main European Parties – EPP, PES, and ALDE tipoffs for vote buying committed by the ethnic Turkish party, DPS.

The Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria party, GERB, calls on the Chief Prosecutor, the Central Electoral Committee, CEC, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, OSCE, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, PASE, the European Commission, EC, the European Parliament, EP, the European People Party, EPP, the Party of European Socialists, PES, and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, ALDE, to probe tipoffs that the ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms, DPS, has been involved in vote buying in the Black Sea city of Varna and the northwestern city of Vratsa.

The DPS Member of the Parliament, Yordan Tsonev, is allegedly involved in the scam.

In the one in Vratsa, a suspected "vote merchant," was arrested on May 3 and is kept under permanent detention.

The man, identified only by his nickname "Turcheto" (the young Turk), was arrested on tipoffs he has been touring the Vratsa region offering people between BGN 100 and BGN 200 in exchange of selling their vote.

He has claimed he worked for a parliamentary represented political party.

The Vratsa Regional Court ruled to keep him behind bars on grounds he could hide or commit another crime.

The authorities have seized from Turcheto lists including the names and personal data of over 800 people and are probing a lead he is part of an organized crime network for "vote trading."

The man, who has a criminal record, has refused any comments for the media.  Witnesses have confirmed he was a vote trader, offering money to people from the region to vote in a certain way, and was acting under the orders of DPS. Pretrial proceedings have been launched.

In Varna, allegedly, Tsonev, who was leading the ethnic Turkish party ballot in one of the voting regions, has been securing the financing for the vote buying, where over 8 000 voters from different districts of the city have been recruited.

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