Bulgaria's Foreign Ministry Under Fire over Servers Deal

The Bulgarian Foreign Ministry's headquarters in Sofia. File photo, BGNES

The Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) has referred to the prosecuting authorities a deal conducted by the Foreign Ministry after the government's resignation that it says amounted to a "theft" of BGN 0.5 M.

Kristian Vigenin, who served as the top Bulgarian diplomat under the 2013-2014 BSP-led government, has accused his successor Daniel Mitov of seeking to avail himself of the funding through the purchase of a new phone system and servers needed for its functioning.

The deal amounts to a "corruption scheme" on which Bulgaria's Chief Prosecutor has already been alerted, stopping transactions on the deal, news website Dnevnik.bg quotes Vigenin as saying.

In his words, after outgoing Prime Minister Boyko Borisov's government stepped down in mid-November, the Foreign Ministry in Sofia sent out instructions and invoices to envoys abroad it said were needed to buy and mount the phone sysem from Balkantel, a Bulgarian company. Each ambassador received EUR 30 000, Vigenin has argued.

The instructions read that servers alone had a price tag of EUR 15 000 to EUR 25 000, even though each diplomatic mission would use the same model, according to daily 24 Chasa's website.

The servers in question, however, are not worth more than EUR 1000 each, Vigenin has estimate, citing references with online stores.

Bulgaria's Foreign Ministry has not immediately commented. 

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