site.btaTISP Leader on Petrohan Case: CC-DB Fully Supports Existence of National Protected Areas Control Agency

Commenting on the Petrohan case, There Is Such a People (TISP) leader Slavi Trifonov wrote on Facebook that the Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria (CC-DB) party fully supports the existence of the National Protected Areas Control Agency (NPACA). He was referring to a nongovernmental organization that the media link to six mystery deaths over the last several days.

On February 2, three men were found shot dead in a privately owned lodge near Petrohan Pass in the Western Balkan Range. Media claims linked them to the NPACA, which has been officially registered by the Environment Ministry and has received donations, including from MPs and the Mayor of Sofia. On February 8, two men and a 15-year-old boy, all of whom had occupied the lodge, were found dead with gunshot wounds in a camper van in a hard-to-reach mountain area on Okolchitsa Peak. The State Agency for National Security head said that two years ago, the Agency conducted a probe into a tipoff from an individual regarding the NGO's activities, alleging that the organization was involved in criminal activity, such as sexual abuse of minors, paramilitary structures using the lodge, and cult-like activities.

"I cannot stop thinking about the father of the 15-year-old child killed in the camper," Trifonov wrote in his post. "I watched him on television calmly explaining that he was not worried about his 15-year-old son at all, even though he had not heard from him for several days, because 'he was in good hands' and he had 'complete trust' in the Lama in question, who is probably responsible for this whole absurd and senseless death," Trifonov wrote.

"I cannot stop thinking - what will this father say now? A 15-year-old child, found with his fingers intertwined, shot dead in a camper near Okolchitsa. They keep talking about the six men who were killed or committed suicide, and they keep missing the fact that one of them was actually a child. What happened and how it happened will become clear, but it is already clear that there are people who are responsible for this," Trifonov's post reads.

According to the TISP Chairman, those responsible for the mystery deaths include Sofia Mayor Vassil Terziev, former minister of environment and water in CC's cabinet Borislav Sandov, MPs of CC-DB Nikolay Denkov and Boyko Rashkov, as well as "DB guru Sasha Bezuhanova."

Trifonov argued that there is a double standard in the media. "If, by chance, the main sponsor of this organization [NPACA] was not the mayor of CC-DB, Vassil Terziev, but Slavi Trifonov, and the signature on the permit [for the NGO's establishment] was not Sandov's, but, say, [outgoing Environment Minister] Grozdan Karadjov's, now their news would be full of my face. This double standard in some Bulgarian media is simply 'delightful,'" he wrote. 

Trifonov added that this is how things are, he cannot change them, "but fortunately there is the internet, where he can freely show the truth as it is."