A handcuffed man with a hood on his head surrounded by masked armed men pushed forward to a military transport airplane. The event takes place at one of the runaways of the airport near the Black Sea town of Varna. It’s not a scene from a Hollywood blockbuster but the end of a successfully conducted operation in which Bulgaria, the U.K., Sweden and Spain took place under the command of Europol. The handcuffed man was the Lithuanian criminal Henrikas Daktaras charged with 30 murders, kidnappings, extortions and traffic of illegally owned weapons. At the end of last week, he was extradited to his homeland to be trailed. During the unofficial meeting of EU interior ministers in Den Hague, where Europol headquarters, its chairman Rob Wainwright gave a certificate for excellent cooperation to Bulgarian Interior Minister Tsvetan Tsvetanov and Lithuanian Interior Minister Rajmundas Palajtis for the successful carrying out the operation in Varna and the capture of Henrikas Daktaras. In his report, Rob Wainwright gave as an example the excellent police cooperation between Bulgarian and Spanish teams, Europol and Eurojust. In a special interview for Radio Bulgaria, Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Tsvetan Tsvetanov said the following:

“This was a joint operation coordinated by Europol between the Bulgarian and Spanish SWAT teams. Together they exposed a criminal group of people counterfeiting euro banknotes and responsible for the distribution of 16 mln such ones across EU. 17 members of the group were captured. The operation was well coordinated between Eurojust and Europol. If a criminal group is active in several EU member states, then a careful analysis of the legislation of each state is made. The country where punishments are most severe, is usually the one preferred for the trial of the criminals so that they get the most severe punishment.”

These days Bulgarian SWAT teams received another high assessment of their work in the countering of international drug trafficking. FBI and DEA officials made the assessment during the official visit of a Bulgarian delegation to the U.S., headed by Interior Minister Tsvetanov.

“We’ve planned joint operations with DEA, Secret Service and the FBI in several fields of operation,” said Tsvetan Tsvetanov to Radio Bulgaria. “The best result for me is that our teams can take advantage of trainings sponsored by law-enforcement agencies in the U.S. The first training will be carried out in the Academy of law-enforcement agencies of the U.S. in Budapest. The Secret Service will hold a special training course as well. In the future, there will be similar trainings. We expect to receive an FBI manual on fighting corruption.”

English version: Delian Zahariev