Bulgaria Opposition Accuses Cabinet of Drug Trafficking Protection

Crime | February 1, 2008, Friday // 00:00
Bulgaria: Bulgaria Opposition Accuses Cabinet of Drug Trafficking Protection Budimir Kujovic (left) was arrested on December 30 in Bulgaria after customer officers seized 60 kilos of heroin at the border. Photo by BGNES. Photo by BGNES

Bulgaria's rightist opposition parties accused the government of patronizing drug trafficking and covering up the involvement of high-ranking officials in the Kujovic drug smuggling scandal that recently jolted the Interior Ministry.

"You are interested in diminishing any suspicion of covering up the ties between the Interior Ministry and organized crime," the leader of hardliner rightist party Democrats for Strong Bulgaria (DSB) Ivan Kostov told the ruling socialist party in Thursday's parliamentary discussions.

The MPs debated a project for the creation of a parliamentary commission, which is to deal with the scandal caused by the arrest of alleged Serbian drug smuggler Budimir Kujovic, issued a Bulgarian passport despite a previous ban to enter the country.

"The problem is not Kujovic himself but if the cabinet patronizes the production of synthetic drugs in Bulgaria and drug trafficking through the borders," DSB MP Atanas Atanasov commented.

He added that the prosecution always tries to clear the Interior Ministry in such cases, as if an instrument of the executive power.

Last week Bulgaria's prosecution closed the file over the Kujovic scandal, saying there is no evidence supporting allegations that high-ranking officials protect drug trafficking.

Budimir Kujovic was arrested on December 30 in Bulgaria on suspicions of masterminding a drug smuggling channel, with customs officers seizing 60 kilograms of heroin at the Kapitan Andreevo border checkpoint.

The arrest came as a surprise, as Kujovic had Bulgarian identification documents issued by the police, despite the 10-year ban to enter the country, which he got in 2005 over accusations of running a laboratory for production of synthetic drugs.

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