Kalin Litov is a police officer who has broken up many cigarette factories, including warehouses in the Plovdiv region. What was impressive is that when there were major operations, he avoided working with Plovdiv employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. For me, he is a very quality professional. He is also a name in the European services regarding cigarettes. This was said by Tihomir Bezlov, chief expert in the program “Security” at the Center for the Study of Democracy, in the program “Offensive with Lyubo Ognyanov” on NOVA NEWS.
He explained that the case of the cigarette smuggling channel in Plovdiv “is not the first clash between various criminal networks, patrons and police structures”.
“We are in the zone of hypotheses, what is clear is that a large amount of cigarettes was seized, but this is not the first case – periodically there is a seizure of a large amount of cigarettes in Plovdiv, Pazardzhik and the villages. This is a fairly strong criminal network that has been talked about for more than 25 years. We are talking about the Haskovo-Plovdiv-Pazardzhik network. The participants are involved in different parts of this business”, he said.
According to his words, it is commented that the cigarettes in question either came from Turkey or Greece.
Bezlov said that the Plovdiv Police Directorate has had the most frequent shifts in the last four years. He believes that this is related to political representation - who the respective minister trusts.
On the topic of whether there could be a change for Bulgarians included in the “Magnitsky” list, Bezlov said that it depends on whether “they will find the right lobbyists and whether they can afford to hire them”. He added that Bulgaria is not Hungary, and Viktor Orban often meets with Donald Trump.