Ukrainians suspected of murdering a journalist

Bulgarian police detained a man in connection with the high-profile murder of journalist Victoria Marinova. In her latest program, she talked about corruption schemes that her colleagues revealed.

Photo: twitter.com/Molenews1

The body of 30-year-old Victoria Marinova was discovered on Sunday. They took the phone, car keys and glasses from the woman. She was partially stripped and, as the investigation established, raped, writes Air Force

Police reported that the detainee is a citizen of Romania and Moldova of Ukrainian origin.

According to the head of the police Ruse, Theodor Atansov, the man was detained for 24 hours for questioning.

“We have a detainee whose alibi we are checking, but so far we cannot say that we have a suspect. Work with the detainee continues,” Reuters reports.

It is unclear whether the murder of a journalist is related to her professional activities.

Marinova was the host of the “Detector” program on the Bulgarian TV channel TVN. She covered the topic of corruption and talked about abuses in the implementation of EU-funded projects.

Criminal scheme

Guests of the last program of Marinova were journalists Dimitar Stoyanov and Attila Biro, who a few days before, they claim, witnessed the mass export and destruction of documents from the offices of a consulting company specializing in the selection of contractors for European projects.

On September 10, the Bulgarian publication Buffalo, where Stoyanov and Biro worked, published material on corruption schemes allegedly involving local businessmen, politicians and even, it was said, Russian oligarchs, as part of an EU-funded series of investigative journalism.

Journalists claim that at the center of the scheme is a consulting company that finds contractors for EU investment projects in Bulgaria.

This company, they believe, saves on materials and work, makes false estimates for investors, pays bribes to officials of local administrations, and withdraws unused money to offshore companies.

The investigation also named the name of a Russian businessman, a former president of a large oil company and a former member of the Federation Council.

Destruction of documents

September 13 Stoyanov and Biro was called by an informant and said that documents had been taken out of the firm’s office for two days. The journalists arrived at the scene and saw closed white trucks leaving the gates of the building.

Following one of them, Stoyanov and Biro got into a wasteland, where, they claim, they saw a mountain of burning documents in plastic bags.

Someone called the police, journalists were detained and taken to the police station of Pernik.

The press cards did not help: the police removed the handcuffs from them only an hour later, after which, according to journalists, for a long time did not allow anyone to call. Total Stoyanov and Biro spent in the area for about seven hours.

The owner of the Buffalo portal, Asen Yordanov, in an interview with the Associated Press, said that he considers Marinova’s murder a warning to journalists.

“Victoria’s death is a brutal murder, an execution. It was something of a warning,” he said.

Fourth journalist

Victoria Marinova became the fourth journalist killed in the EU since the beginning of 2017.

Last August, Swedish journalist Kim Waal was killed by inventor Peter Madsen on board a submarine belonging to him.

In October, the Maltese journalist Daphne Caruana Galicia was killed in an explosion that destroyed her car.

In October, Slovak investigative journalist Jan Kuciak and his bride, Martina Kusnirova, were found shot dead in their home in the village of Velka Macha, approximately 65 km east of Bratislava. Kutsyaku and Kusnirova were 27 years old.

In Reporters Without Borders' annual press freedom rankings, Bulgaria fell to 111th place this year, the lowest among EU countries.

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