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Bulgaria's Supreme Prosecutor's Office of Cassation has declared that the money of the new media tycoon Irena Krasteva had not been acquired illegally.
The Supreme Prosecutor's Office of Cassation started a procedure to investigate the origin of the money with which "New Bulgarian Media Group Holding" owned by Irena Krasteva and her son Delyan Peevski, who is a Deputy Minister of Emergency Situations, at the signal of the Member of Parliament from the far-right Ataka party, Mirko Dimitrov.
The pretext for the requested investigation was the recent sale of the cable TV channel "TV7", and of the newspaper Ekspres Daily to an unnamed investor, in which Krasteva's New Bulgarian Media Group served as a consultant.
Krasteva, who is a former head of the Bulgarian State Lottary, is also the owner of the Monitor Daily, the Telegraf Daily, the Politika Weekly, and the local Veliko Turnovo daily "Borba", and is also expected to buy out the Plovdiv daily "Maritza".
Most of these newspapers were bought by Krasteva in the summer of 2007, the total purchases amounting to over BGN 10 M.
Even though the Supreme Prosecutor's Office of Cassation said Krasteva's money was clean, it did not specify was exactly was the origin of these funds.
According to the original signal of MP Mirko Dimitrov, Krusteva's former position as top ranking civil servant, and the present position of her son as a Deputy Minister necessitate an investigation of the origin of the capital of the firms, in which they participate.
According to Dimitrov, there was reason to believe that funds with suspiciously unclear origin allowed Krusteva and her son Peevski to become media magnates.
Reports in various Bulgarian media have cited unofficial information that the unnamed investor buying TV7 and the Ekspres Daily is the Corporate Bank.
The head of the Corporate Bank Tzvetan Vasilev as well as Krasteva and Peevski are believed to be in close relations with the ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms DPS, which is a junior partner in the governing three-way coalition.
The Deputy Minister of Emergency Situations Delyan Peevski was appointed from the quota of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms. He is notorious for having been fired by the Prime Minister Stanishev in May 2007 over allegations of abuse of power.
In November 2007, however, the Prime Minister had to restore Peevski to the position he held formerly as the prosecutors in Sofia found no evidence of his guilt.
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