Vassil Donev

GERB leader Boyko Borissov speaks at a-post-election press conference in Sofia, 5 April 2023. Photo: EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV

The prosecution says there is now incriminating evidence that Bulgaria's PM for much of the time from 2009 to 2021 provided third parties with funds - acquired from crime - to purchase and rent real estate abroad. 

Rumen Radev (right) and Mariya Gabriel, the GERB-SDS party's candidate for prime minister, at a ceremony to hand over the mandate to form a new government in Sofia on Monday. Photo: EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV

Boyko Borissov, leader of Bulgaria's GERB party, speaks at a press conference in Sofia, Bulgaria, 4 October 2022. Photo: EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV

Rumen Radev, Bulgarian president, running for a new mandate, in Sofia, 18 November 2021. Photo; EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV

This will be the fifth general election in Bulgaria in two years and will be followed by mayoral elections later in 2023, which will test the centre-right GERB party's dominance in local administration.

People demonstrate in front of the Russian embassy in Sofia on 24 February in support of Ukraine. Photo: EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV

Over 56,000 refugees from Ukraine are currently being hosted in Bulgaria and are now being moved to different state-owned bases.

Banners lie on a street during a rally against violence against women marking International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women in Sofia, 25 November 2019. EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV

Lawyer Denitsa Ivanova, part of the NGO 'Deystvie' (Action), told BIRN the decision was "extremely disappointing". 

Kornelia Ninova, the leader of the Bulgarian Socialist Party, casts her vote at parliamentary elections in March 2017. Photo: EPA/VASSIL DONEV

The BSP, which came third in the most recent polls in July, is being given the chance to form a government after failed attempts by the winning party There is Such a Nation and former Prime Minister Boyko Borissov's GERB.

A vial of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at the Maichin Dom University Hospital in Sofia in January. Photo: EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV

But some parents who oppose the testing launched an online petition against it on Monday, which already has over 13,500 signatures.

Bulgarian PM Boyko Borissov and his Russian counterpart Dimitri Medvedev discuss energy projects on August 12. Photo: EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV.

Prosecutor-general Sotir Tsatsarov told media on Tuesday that Nikolay Malinov has been charged with espionage and that a former senior Russian intelligence officer, Leonid Reshetnikov, has been barred from entering Bulgaria.