Bulgaria’s ruling party joins calls for Constitutional Court judge’s resignation over alleged flight with Peevski

Desislava Atanassova must resign as a Constitutional Court judge “as a moral act” after Interior Minister Ivan Demerdzhiev told Parliament that in April 2024 she had accompanied Delyan Peevski on a private aircraft flight from Sofia to Dubai, ruling Progressive Party MP Milen Trifonov told bTV on July 3.

Trifonov said that he expects the Progressive Bulgaria parliamentary group to come up with an official position on Atanasova’s future in the Constitutional Court.

He described as “scandalous” the information on the informal relations between Atanassova, formerly head of the GERB-UDF parliamentary group before her election to the Constitutional Court, and Peevski, who is subject to US and UK sanctions for corruption.

Atanassova was elected in 2024 by Parliament for a nine-year term on the Constitutional Court.

She was elected with the votes of GERB-UDF, Peevski’s Movement for Rights and Freedoms, and the then We Continue the Change – Democratic Bulgaria coalition, at the time of the informal “assemblage” governing coalition.

Then-president, now Prime Minister and Progressive Bulgaria leader Roumen Radev boycotted Atanassova’s swearing-in.

Constitutional Court judges are not subject to recall by Parliament, and their terms may end early only in the event of resignation, a court sentence to prison, inability to perform duty as a judge for more than a year, or conflict of interest.

Trifonov called for a full investigation into the case, including how Peevski’s trips on private flights were financed.

“It is not important what the trips are, but how they are financed. The person Peevski has been sanctioned under the Magnitsky Act. The scheme involves payments through a law firm, but how did he receive them? Did it donate them to Peevski? Were these donations declared?” Trifonov said.

Trifonov rejected Peevski’s defence that there was interference in his personal life.

“Our personal life is not a personal life, entering politics. Here we are talking about the leader of a party with extremely great influence in the governance of the state,” he said.

In Parliament on July 3, opposition party We Continue the Change called for the whole truth about the trips of Peevski and Atanassova.

On July 2, Ivailo Mirchev, of the opposition Democratic Bulgaria coalition, said: “When will Desislava Atanassova resign as a constitutional judge?”

Mirchev said that the information presented to Parliament by Demerdzhiev about Peevski’s trips on private flights and the origin of funds for them corresponded to its alert submitted some months ago by Democratic Bulgaria about significant discrepancies in Peevski’s declared and actual property status.

Bozhidar Bozhanov, deputy leader of the Democratic Bulgaria parliamentary group, said on July 2 that the Sofia City Prosecutor’s Office had “crushed” the signal about Peevski’s flights and the negotiation of public procurement contracts in Dubai.

“But in spite of this, today Minister Demerdzhiev presented huge sums and dozens of flights to Peevski, without it being clear where the money came from,” Bozanov said.

On July 2, Kostadin Kostadinov, leader of Vuzrazhdane – Parliament’s smallest group – also called for Atanassova’s resignation.

“If Desislava Atanassova has political integrity, she should resign,” Kostadinov said.

Demerdzhiev told Parliament on July 2 that over eight years, Peevski had flown out of Sofia 227 times, of which 181 were charter flights.

According to Demerdzhiev, some of the charter flights were paid for by the Angelo Andreev and Partners law firm, which he said he believed were counsel for Peevski.

He said that the law firm had paid more than 122 000 euro for six flights, or an average of 10 000 euro a flight. Interior Ministry calculations were that the 181 charter flights would have cost about 1.8 million euro.

Demerdzhiev told Parliament that those who had joint reservations with Peevski on the flights included business person Aleksandar Staliyski in 2019 and Atanassova in April 2024.

The Interior Minister said that the April 2024 flight with Atanassova was on the carrier Hyperion Aviation.

“This company is associated with a lady – Krassimira Kamenova, who has a child with Georgi Petrov Papazki, who is the brother of Walter Papazki,” Demerdzhiev said. Reportedly, the names of the Papazki brothers are associated with the gambling business.

Demerdzhiev said that “in any civilised country, such a combination would raise an enormous number of questions.”

“We are not showing unhealthy curiosity, but we are very interested in whether some of these flights are not related to some type of impact and to what extent these impacts are regulated. Many businessmen have joint reservations with Peevski, such as Dobrin Ivanov – a man known in the arms business, but there is no evidence that he boarded this flight,” Demerdzhiev said.

On July 2, GERB-UDF parliamentary group deputy leader Kostadin Angelov said that he doubted the information presented by Demerdzhiev.

“We are not sure about the truth of the facts that Minister of Interior Ivan Demerdzhiev presented, since before him another Minister of Interior, Emil Dechev, reported the opposite information,” Angelov said.

“In this regard, we believe that the private life of every Bulgarian citizen cannot be commented on politically and we have no intention of doing so,” he said.

It was not clear to which information presented by Dechev Angelov was referring.

Peevski told journalists in the corridors of Parliament that Demerdzhiev had illegally investigated his private life in connection with flights that he said were paid for by himself and his family.

“My personal life is my topic and not anyone else’s, provided that no public funds is used for my expenses,” Peevski said.

Asked about payment for the flights had been made given that he is subject to Magnitsky Act sanctions, Peevski said that the sanctions do not apply in Bulgaria.

On July 3, Bulgarian National Radio reported Constitutional Court President Pavlina Panova as saying that the court was examining the data presented by Demerdzhiev regarding a joint trip on a private flight to Dubai by Peevski and Atanassova.

Panova said that the institution does not have legal mechanisms for responding to such cases.

On July 3, Atanassova denied that she had travelled with Peevski on the private flight to Dubai.

She described Demerdzhiev’s statements to Parliament on July 2 as false.

Atanassova said that she had requested and received a certificate from the Interior Ministry about her trips outside Bulgaria from April 5 to 8 2024.

“The claim that ‘on April 5, 2024, Desislava Atanassova travelled with Delyan Peevski from Vasil Levski Airport Sofia to Dubai with a private company Hyperion Aviation’ is false,” she said.

“I left the country on 05.04.2024 on civil flight TK 1032 – a passenger aircraft of Turkish Airlines and returned on 08.04.2024 on civil flight TK 1031 – a passenger aircraft of Turkish Airlines.

“On the indicated dates, I flew on the Sofia – Istanbul – Sofia route, on a civil flight, and I resided solely on the territory of the Republic of Türkiye, which is also certified by the data in my passport,” she said.

Demerdzhiev told reporters on July 3 that he suspected that Interior Ministry officials had deleted data related to the flights of Peevski.

“Let the people from MRF-New Beginning keep in mind that this information is contained in many, including international, registers,” Demerdzhiev said.

“If Ms. Atanasova and Mr. Peevski are so confident that this information is not contained in the registers of the Bulgarian Border Police, it is very interesting to me – if it is not contained, why is it not contained and what are the reasons for this,” he said.

Demerdzhiev said that Peevski had said something very scandalous – that the Magnitsky Act sanctions do not apply in Bulgaria.

“I actually want to tell him that now, at this moment, both Bulgarian legislation and sanctions are applied on the territory of the Republic of Bulgaria – I want to surprise him with this news,” Demerdzhiev said.

“And I will do everything necessary to establish whether there is manipulation of information, whether there are irregularities in the actions of any employee,” he said.

“And if there is, he will bear the full severity of the law. And let them explain where they have so much information, which they cannot have without access to relevant services, in which the information is classified in one form or another,” Demerdzhiev said.

(Photo: Constitutional Court)