A notorious figure of the Bulgarian criminal underground, Krasimir Kamenov, nicknamed Karo, and his wife were killed in a bloody massacre in Cape Town, South Africa, on Thursday, sources confirmed to EURACTIV on Thursday.
Karo was known as part of the former Bulgarian criminal group VIS-2, which had enormous economic and political power before Bulgaria became a member of the EU in 2007.
In addition to Kamenov and his wife, their two housemaids were also shot during the attack. The three children of the Bulgarian crime boss survived because they were at school at the time of the attack.
Kamenov was wanted with a red notice by Interpol due to suspected involvement in the murder of the Bulgarian criminal police’s former boss, Lubomir Ivanov, in early 2022.
The South African police published information that they found the bodies of four people – two men and two women, “who are believed to be of Bulgarian origin” in Kamenov’s house. The four were shot dead, and the Bulgarian special services unofficially confirmed Kamenov was killed. The bodies were found in a Cape Town suburb at around 8.20 am local time on Thursday.
The shooting of Kamenov takes place as Sofia is undergoing a huge political shakeup after it was announced that long-term political rivals, the GERB party of long-serving Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borissov and We Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria joined forces to lead the new government together.
“We are going back to gangster times,” Bulgaria’s Chief Prosecutor Ivan Geshev said after the news of Kamenov’s murder.
Geshev is expected to be the first victim since the formation of the new coalition after the head of the prosecution was accused of illegally recording a colleague in the Supreme Judicial Council. Just a month and a half ago, Geshev named Kamenov his shadow enemy and suspected him of participating in a group to discredit the Prosecutor General and the Prosecutor’s Office. Two weeks later, an explosion occurred near Geshev’s car, but he did not name Kamenov as the suspect.
Kamenov was known as the owner of a large fruit and vegetable market in Sofia. Large quantities of cocaine were found at the market several times in recent years, but there is no public information that Kamenov was associated with these drugs.
Under the leadership of former European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, about three and half years ago, the Commission stopped monitoring Bulgaria under the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism.
It decided that the poorest EU country had solved its old problems with organised crime, turning a blind eye to the lack of results in the fight against corruption at the highest level.,
Bulgaria is now pushing to enter the visa-free Schengen zone, but the Netherlands insists the Commission renews such monitoring.
(Krassen Nikolov | EURACTIV.bg)
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