Bulgarian prosecutors backtrack on ‘murder plot’ against Peevski
Bulgarian Prosecutor-General Sotir Tsatsarov said on June 18 that there was no evidence of a plot to murder controversial figure Delyan Peevski.
This is a reverse of the position previously taken by prosecutors, who had said that they would appeal against a Sofia City Court ruling releasing without bail three men held on charges of conspiring to assassinate Peevski.
Tsatsarov told reporters that the pre-trial proceedings against the three had been initiated under “emergency circumstances”. The preliminary investigation was done by the Interior Ministry, which then involved prosecutors.
As the Sofia City Court had found, Tsatsarov said that there was “no evidence of a murder attempt. We should clearly confess this fact”.
“It is better to admit an error than for this to continue,” he said.
He said that all that there might be was evidence of an attempt to keep Peevski under surveillance and track his whereabouts.
The three men, Ventsislav Vurbanov, Georgi Hristov and Krassimir Metodiev, were held last week, the news emerging around the time that prosecutors and police carried out a large-scale search-and-seizure operation at a building in Sofia’s Tsar Boris III Boulevard.
Earlier, reports in media seen as close to Peevski alleged that the supposed murder plot had been ordered by Corporate Commercial Bank majority shareholder Tsvetan Vassilev. CCB responded with accusations against the prosecutor’s office as biased and as being used as a tool in a plot against it.
Peevski and Vassilev previously were seen as having close business relations, but there has been a falling-out over CCB taking action against companies for non-performing loans.
The Prosecutor’s office responded with a statement that the institution was fulfilling its obligations in law “and any suggestion that it is a factor in the political life of the country are unworthy and speculative”.
