Sofia City Court has sentenced Mithat Tabakov, a Member of Parliament from the ethnic Turkish party DPS (Movement for Rights and Freedoms) to five year in jail.

Tabakov has been found guilty of criminal breach of trust by signing an unfavorable contract in his capacity of Mayor of the Municipality of Dulovo in Northeastern Bulgaria back in 2009.

The outcome of the trial that continued for more than two years came Monday night.

Tabakov's lawyer Balgarin Balgarinov has been quick to vow to appeal the verdict before the Sofia Appellate Court, as cited by BGNES.

Tabakov's former deputy in the Dulovo Municipality, Altan Chaushev, has also been found guilty of the same crime, and has gotten of a four-year sentence.

Tabakov and Chaushev have been sentenced for disobeying the Public Procurement Act by signing a contract for construction of water supply and sewage infrastructure under EU Operational Program Environment.

According to the prosecution, the BGN 28 M contract made by then Mayor Tabakov incurred a loss of BGN 11 M to the municipality.

Ethnic Turkish party DPS MP Mithat Tabakov has also been charged with accepting a large-scale bribe in a separate court trial that started on October 14, 2011.

According to the new charges raised against him, in October-November 2004, in his capacity as Dulovo Mayor Tabakov demanded and received a BGN 10 000 bribe directly into his bank account from the manager of the Water Supply and Sewage OOD firm in the northeastern city of Silistra Petko Gorbanov in order to make a contract with the firm for the rehabilitation of the water supply system of the village of Vokil.

Back in September 2010, Tabakov was implicated in a seizure when the Bulgarian Committee in charge of seizing illegally acquired assets in favor of the state levied a distraint on property worth BGN 2.3 M of another MP from the ethnic Turkish party DPS, Gyunay Sefer.

The measure was imposed on Sefer because he and Tabakov, were tried for embezzlement of money from public procurements.

The two were elected on the ticket of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (DPS) in the Bulgarian town of Silistra.

The indictment stated that Sefer and Tabakov embezzled money from two public procurements for construction of a road between the village of Okorsh and the central road connecting the city of Shumen and the town of Silistra.

Their companies have won a tender for the construction of a 7.3 km road, while in the end only 1.7 km have been finished.

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