site.btaNessebur Mayor Charged with Heading Criminal Group for Vote Buying

ESD 13:49:31 23-10-2019
SN1345ES.113
113 POLITICS-MAYOR-VOTE BUYING CHARGES

Mayor of Seaside Town of Nessbur
Charged with Masterminding Criminal Group for
Vote Buying


Bourgas, on the Black Sea, October 23 (BTA) - The mayor of the seaside town of Nessebur, Nikolai Dimitrov, has been charged with masterminding a criminal group for vote buying and with breach of citizens' voting rights, Dimitrov's lawyer, Peter Atanassov, told BTA. Dimitrov has already been taken in remand in Sofia.

According to the charges, the group consists of five persons.

Dimitrov talked with his lawyer over the phone.

The detainee is banned from leaving the country.

Dimitrov will not be able to vote at Sunday's local elections in Bulgaria but remains a runner for a new term, his lawyer said. Atanassov said his client had not spoken about threats, but expected that "something will happen related to the elections".

The development comes a day after the Central Election Commission okayed that Dimitrov, two runners for municipal councillors in Nessebur from the Bulgarian Socialist Party, a municipal councillor candidate of the Movement 21, and a runner of the Movement 21 for a mayor of nearby Sveti Vlas, can be remanded and charged.

Arrest warrants for all five were received from the Prosecutor General on Monday in one and the same pre-trial proceeding.

Dnevnik.bg writes that Dimitrov has so far served three mayoral terms. He was elected to the post in 2007, winning 68.04 per cent of the ballot, as an independent candidate. Since then, he has always run for re-election as an independent candidate, every time wining by a large margin. In 2015 Dimitrov won already at the first-round voting, gaining 53 per cent. Now he is running against two other candidates, Atanas Terziev of GERB, and Krassimir Kossev of a party called Podem [Upsurge]. LN/ZH