Bulgarian Ultranationalist Claims Latest Airport Row Was 'Staged'

Bulgarian ultranationalist leader Volen Siderov has claimed the latest public row he was involved in was the result of a conspiracy.

Siderov triggered a scandal late on Monday by verbally assaulting a French cultural attach? during a Sofia-Varna flight and later attacking a man in a Varna airport shuttle bus.

The shuttle bus incident resulted in a scuffle in which two men, including a police officer, were allegedly injured by Siderov and his entourage. The ultranationalist leader is now investigated for hooliganism and causing slight bodily harm.

Speaking on Tuesday, Siderov insisted that the incident was deliberately “staged” by Varna district governor Ivan Velikov.

Siderov and his extremist Ataka (Attack) party were to protest Tuesday against Velikov’s decision to scrap a municipal bill that would have renamed a number of Turkish toponyms in the region.

The ultranationalist MP claimed that Velikov had organized a conspiracy against him that involved the police and the Chief Prosecutor’s Office.

Siderov further condemned the media coverage of Monday’s incident, calling the journalists “hyenas”, “vultures”, and “wretched and corrupt Bulgarophobes.”

“God will punish you for the incorrect coverage. Damn you!” he said, as cited by Darik radio.

Volen Siderov, the leader of the ultranationalist Ataka  party, has been involved in a number of scandals over the last few years. In 2010, he was detained in Germany after he hurled racist insults at the attendants of a Lufthansa flight.

In September, he and a group of Ataka MPs stirred a row in a renowned Brussels restaurant.

Even though it is not officially in power, Siderov’s anti-Western party remains a key ally of the country’s fragile Socialist-led coalition government. -

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