Notorious Bulgarian businessmen are pressuring the Bulgarian Tourist Union to transfer to them ownership rights to mountain huts and chalets, stated the Union's executive secretary Thursday as reported by Darik Radio.

The Bulgarian Tourist Union is the non-profit and non-governmental entity owning for the most part the large network of mountain huts in Bulgaria's mountains, like Rila, Pirin, Stara Planina and Rhodope Mountains.

Huts are usually leased out by the Union to persons or entities that manage and run them.

Thursday the Union's executive secretary Ventsislav Udev stated that people are filing claims that the ownership of huts belongs to local municipalities. That facilitates a future sale to private individuals, as state-owned property in Bulgaria is more difficult to be privatized than municipality-owned.

Thursday the Bulgarian Tourist Union's secretary alarmed that since 1989 the Union has lost control of some 121 mountain huts, of which 56 have been acquired by means of the above procedure.

Udev quoted the names of notorious businessmen Hristo Kovachki, Manol Velen and Tseko Minev, some of whom have faced trials for other issues, as expressing interest in mountain chalets.

Kovachki, for instance, is being investigated on tax evasion charges. He was also allegedly involved in some of Bulgaria's notorious land swaps and acquired forest lands in the Rila mountains to facilitate him create a new ski resort in the area of Govedartsi and Malyovitsa. The project for the new resort borders the area of Rila National Park, which has led environmental activist to fear encroachment on the Park.

Just this Tuesday Euractiv came out with an article entitled “'Wild Capitalism' Destroying Habitats in Bulgaria.”