Former head of Bulgaria’s security agency ‘missing’ – reports
The former head of Bulgaria’s State Agency for National Security (SANS) has been missing since December 5, local media reported on December 8.
Police were trying “unofficially” to find Petko Sertov at the request of his wife, although Sertov has not officially been declared a missing person. The Interior Ministry has not confirmed the reports.
Sertov is said to have left home on December 5, and was seen getting into a Volkswagen Golf. He did not take his two mobile phones with him when he left.
Appointed as the first head of SANS, from January 2008 to the summer of 2009, Sertov became the head of the Cabinet office’s center for prevention and counteraction of corruption and organised crime, a post he held until March 2013, when he was dismissed by then-prime minister Boiko Borissov.
While heading SANS, he reappointed Alexei Petrov, a former state security agent, as an adviser in the office of the management of the agency. Petrov, along with others, is currently facing serious organised crime charges. Petrov denies wrongdoing.
It was while Sertov was head of SANS that the “Galeria” affair made headlines after it emerged that the agency had been conducting covert surveillance of journalists in connection with an investigation into media reports that may have been based on leaks from SANS.
Since leaving state employment, Sertov has been assisting his wife who owns a travel agency.
