Yesterday's incident with the motorcade of the chief prosecutor Ivan Geshev, on the way to Samokov, provoked a wave of reactions, both from the political parties represented in the parliament*, as well as from the judiciary and the competent authorities. Bulgaria’s Supreme Judicial Council strongly condemns the assassination attempt against the Chief Prosecutor, defining it as an attack on the Bulgarian state, the judiciary and its independence. The SAC rejects the "demonstrated desire to destabilize the judicial power and control it by means of force, unknown in Bulgaria’s recent history and uncharacteristic of democratic and legal states". 

Prosecutors and investigators have shown their unity against attempts to intimidate them through a symbolic protest before the courthouse buildings in the country:

"The unanimous conclusion of all the experts is that it was a concentrated and directed explosion. The blast wave and fragments were directed from the side of the road to the roadway. It was a matter of, perhaps, fractions of a second that the explosion was met with the side of the car, and not the front right fender. Perhaps these fractions of a second saved the occupants of the car," commented the director of the National Investigation Service, Borislav Sarafov, on the case.

He noted that the expertise of the explosive device prepared by the Special Anti-Terrorism Squad showed that it was a home-made device, which speaks of the professionalism of the one who prepared it and planted it to strike at an appropriate moment by electronic blasting.

Meanwhile, investigators and police began a second inspection of the blast site. This section of the road between the capital Sofia and Samokov remains closed until the investigation on the scene of the accident is completed.

Despite the clarifications given by the investigation, there are still many uncertainties in the case.

"There are some inconsistencies that are disturbing to me. The level of crime in Bulgaria in recent years does not suggest an assassination attempt against the Prosecutor General. It has been a long time since a very grave crime has been committed. The most serious are domestic murders. In addition, when the prosecutor's office did the press conference a while ago explaining the threats, it was about oligarchs and criminals raising money to pay lobbyists to smear the prosecutor general. It's not clear to me why you have to pour a huge amount of money into lobbyists, when you are preparing to kill someone," former interior minister Emanuil Yordanov commented for the BNR.

The question of the motive of the crime remains open.

Photos: BGNES