This is what Dorothy from "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" would have said to her dog friend Toto if they were in 21st century, EU-member-state Bulgaria.

Except in this case Dorothy and Toto would not be taken away by a cyclone as in Kansas. Instead, they could disappear with the kind assistance on part of the gangs of nice kidnappers that have been targeting prominent Bulgarian businessmen over the last several months.

The President of the Litex Football Club Angel Bonchev, his wife Aneliya Boncheva, the businessman Kiro Kirov, the still missing prominent manager Vene Sotirov - these are just a few of those who recently fell pray to Bulgaria's kidnapping mafia that abducts rich or prominent people for ransom...

So far Bulgaria was known in Europe and beyond for its 200 still unsolved gangland killings since 1999. Apparently, it will now also have to be recognized for the unsolved cases of kidnappings for ransom, whose number is rapidly piling up.

"I've a feeling we are not in EU any more", Dorothy would have said to Toto simply because, for one thing, stuff like that doesn't happen in the real EU member states, and, for another, if occasionally it does, the real EU member states do react with the full power of their state apparatuses...

The Bulgarian kidnappers seem to be very professional - they appear to be able to rival their Latin American colleagues. But perhaps something else is more true here - the total impotence and unconditional surrender of the Bulgarian state and its policing institutions.

But the Bulgarian Interior and National Security Agency can't find them... Come on, give us a break, will ya! There's a just handful of people in Bulgaria, everyone knows everyone, information is leaking all over the place...

With 65 000 police officers and an army of 45 000 one can easily search every single house in Bulgaria in a couple of days, if needed... Actually, not in Bulgaria, just in the outskirts of Sofia - everyone knows the kidnappers don't bother taking their victims to Vidin or Silistra...

This might seem ridiculous but if this is the only single way the Bulgarian state could deal with the problem - mobilize the army! Why not? Or whatever else it takes... Just show some will, some resolve, some courage, whatever you have to show in our to make it seem as if we are in the EU, and not at some other latitudes...

None of that is happening, however. The kidnappers are practically raging at will, capturing whoever they want, and the responsible institutions are irresponsibly scratching their foreheads trying to come up with more arguments as to why they can't solve the cases...

Still, in today's Bulgaria, Dorothy would have been much better off than the poor Bulgarian victims, if abducted...

Dorothy has got her Silver Shoes that could help her escape from her potential abductors but none of the prominent Bulgarian victims have anything like that.

All they have are brainless-Scarecrow, rusty-Tin-Woodman, Cowardly-Lion state institutions. Unlike Dorothy's case, however, none of these are likely to magically get transformed in the end...

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