site.btaPolice Detains 54-year-old Man for Damaging Bust of Russian Statesman Nikolay Ignatyev

A 54-year-old man was detained in Varna on Thursday for damaging a monument of Russian statesman and diplomat Count Nikolay Ignatyev in Varna's City Garden, the Interior Ministry Regional Directorate in Varna said. The bust of Ignatyev was ripped from its pedestal on Tuesday night.

The man was arrested for 24 hours. A forensic psychiatric examination has been ordered for him. All the materials of the pre-trial proceedings have been handed over to the District Prosecution Office in the city.

This was not the first attack on the bust of Ignatyev in Varna. Some ten months ago, it was splashed over with white paint and the perpetrator was arrested.

Nikolay Ignatyev was an extremely controversial figure in Bulgarian history. He was a fierce opponent of the 19th century struggles for Bulgarian ecclesiastical independence and a separate and independent Bulgarian state, although he had ambitions to become the first Bulgarian knyaz (a noble title in Slavic lands, usually translated into English as prince or duke). At that time, the Russian press described him as "The Russian Knyaz of the Bulgarians". He initiated the signing of the Preliminary Treaty of San Stefano between Russia and the Ottoman Empire, concluded on March 3, 1878 (old style February 19), in disagreement with the Russian foreign ministry, as it was unenforceable, given the secret Reichstadt Agreement between Russia and Austria-Hungary, which had already been concluded in 1876.