Road safety

Series of road accidents resulted in casualties and injuries in all parts of Bulgaria on Saturday.

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Bulgaria's traffic police will not pull over motorists for speeding and all contacts between drivers and police on the road will be filmed.

This are the two main measures against traffic police corruption, presented by Bulgaria's Interior Minister Veselin Vuchkov at a press conference on Tuesday in Sofia.

Bulgaria's Interior Ministry will present on Tuesday new rules for the work of police officers, aiming to combat corruption, especially among traffic police.

The new rules will minimise the direct contact between the traffic police and the motorists. One of the ideas is to film each interaction between the police and the drivers.

In 2014 the number of casualties in traffic accidents in Bulgaria will most likely exceed 600, the chairperson of the Association of car accident victims Vladimir Todorov told the Focus news agency.

Since the beginning of the year on Bulgaria's roads died 571 people and more than 7000 have been injured, according to data of Bulgaria's Interior Ministry.

The municipal council of Bulgaria's coast city of Varna introduced stiff fines for parking violations in the city, reports the Varna Utre website.

The proposal, tabled by Varna Mayor Ivan Portnih, provides for increase of fines for parking on pedestrian crossings, parks, park alleys, playgrounds and pavements.

Pedestrians in Bulgaria are nearly twice as careless compared to car drivers, statistical figures have shown.

According to Traffic Police data, almost 10,000 pedestrians have been fined for crossing the street in violation of regulations in the first nine months of the year, while less than 5,800 car drivers have been fined for violating pedestrians' right of way.

Blogger Melih Karakelle has written a piece to inform his friends and relatives why he left Turkey. His blog, www.melihkarakelle.com, is usually visited by 500 people a month. But his latest piece hit 100,000 in the first 24 hours.

In the wake of a spate of serious road accidents caused by trucks, Transport Minister Michalis Chrysochoidis on Thursday heralded the creation of a new state body to oversee truck safety.

Road safety campaigners held a protest on Wednesday at the spot on Petrou Ralli Street where three people were run over and killed last week.

A group called SOSTE organized the event.

It demanded that speed limits in Athens be brought down to 30 km per hour.

Attica Governor Rena Dourou lent her support and said that road safety must become a policy priority.

A shuttle bus driver pulled a gun on a jaywalker after an argument at the intersection of Slivnitsa boulevard and Opalchenska street in Sofia, reports the BNR public broadcaster.

According to the testimony of passengers in the bus and motorists, the driver and the pedestrian got into a heated argument and the driver put a gun to the head of the jaywalker on Thursday morning.