site.btaCC-DB’s Mirchev Demands Parliamentary Inquiry over Borissov-Trump Jr. Meeting

There should be a parliamentary inquiry into the meeting between GERB leader Boyko Borissov and Donald Trump Jr., said Ivaylo Mirchev, Co-chair of Yes, Bulgaria and MP of the Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria (CC-DB). Speaking to reporters in Parliament's lobby on Tuesday, Mirchev said that both Borissov and the Energy Minister should be heard.

The Wall Street Journal article headlined "He Drops Trump Jr.’s Name in Pursuit of Billion-Dollar Deals. It’s Getting Awkward," reads that "former Prime Minister Boyko Borissov, still Bulgaria’s most powerful man,” saw an opportunity in April when Trump Jr. was on his Eastern European tour, to “advertise the pipeline and other Bulgarian assets.” Borissov hoped, the article adds, to “secure a meeting with the US President he met in 2019” and was “seeking relief from US Magnitsky Act sanctions for some of his close allies.”

On Monday, Borissov said he “always promotes Balkan Stream” and categorically denied lobbying for the removal of MP Delyan Peevski from the Magnitsky list. He explained, however, that he told the son of the US president about “the man who was put on the Magnitsky list even though he brought Bulgaria into the European Banking Union and the euro area,” referring to former finance minister Vladislav Goranov. “I did not mention Peevski,” the GERB leader stressed. He also denied offering the Lukoil refinery in Burgas (on the Black Sea).

Mirchev said it was “extremely surprising” that there has been no clear explanation so far of how such a meeting took place and how it was possible for Borissov to attempt to have Peevski removed from the Magnitsky list by offering Bulgarian assets. He noted that the refinery in question is a major national asset.

He added that Trump Jr.’s office has not commented on or announced a meeting with Borissov, mentioning only a working lunch, while GERB merely hinted at the conversation. Mirchev noted that a meeting of such calibre, held without an official statement and later linked to discussions about exchanging assets for the removal of a politician from the Magnitsky list, needs at minimum a hearing and a parliamentary inquiry.

Mirchev warned that if corruption in Bulgaria has reached a point where billions in national assets and interests could be traded to remove a single politician from the Magnitsky list, it would indicate a serious problem.