Human
rights news: February 2001
14 February 2001 |
New director-general of Bulgarian state radio elected |
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12 February 2001 |
Police officer shoots dead 31-year-old man |
Sofia, 14-02-2001 - With seven votes to two Ivan Borislavov - poet, translator and long-time radio employee, was elected director-general of Bulgarian National Radio (BNR) on February 6. Seven members of the National Radio and Television Council (NRTC) - Alexander Tomov, Yosif Sarchadzhiev, Dimitar Korudzhiev, Valja Radinska, Ivo Draganov, Boyka Yancheva and Ivailo Petrov elected Borislavov to the post. The remaining two, Georgi Lozanov and Svetlana Bozhilova, supported the Bulgarian Media Coalition nominee Rayna Konstantinova, director of Radio Bulgaria. [The Bulgarian Media Coalition represents eleven media and human rights organizations, including the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee].
The selection procedure under which Borislavov was chosen from different nominations made by professional organisations was introduced after the NRTC failed to elect a candidate for the post in the first round. At that time three candidates presented their concept plans for the further development of the radio - Alexander Velev, former radio director, Valeri Todorov - BNR correspondent, and Dimitar Dimitrov, head of the radio's Horizont programme. The NCRT declared the publicly presented concept plans for a transition to a public radio unconvincing, and launched a new procedure two weeks later.
The choice triggered a weeklong protest among the journalists from the BNR Horizont programme. At the same time, nearly 500 radio journalists demanded the NRTC's resignation on account of its having brutally violated the necessary prerequisites for a real reform in the state radio by means of a legitimate nomination. Borislavov is not popular among his colleagues and this, coupled with his two disciplinary dismissals from the radio, is what basically triggered the protests. The protesters also claim that Borislavov has failed to prove his 'professional vision' for the management of an institution of the range of the state radio (the radio employs some 1,500 staff and is experiencing an acute financial deficit for modernizing its existing programmes).
On 13 February the seven NRTC members approved the BNR Board proposed by the radio director. The board includes Velichko Konakchiev, Alexander Brazitsov, Aneta Yanakieva and the film director Kiril Kamenov. Polya Stancheva, current programme director at the BNR, whose public biography is closely linked with the authorities, was also nominated for board member. Georgi Vassilski, head of the Hristo Botev programme, went on strike after Borislavov offered his post to the poet Nikolay Pavlov, without Vassilski having handed in his resignation.
The radio journalists will continue their protest activities in compliance with the Act on Assemblies, Demonstrations and Meetings, until their demands for the resignation of the NRTC are met. After their 12 February meeting with the NRTC, the journalists also demand that an independent expert evaluation of Borislavov's management concept plan is carried out. The law provides that a strike can be started at the BNR after 50 plus one votes are collected in favour of this.
Ivan Borislavov has still not signed a managerial contract with the NCRT.
The protesters' demands, which include information free from authority control and the establishment of a public radio, are backed by the larger part of the press and professional and public organisations. The International Federation of Journalists also supports their demands. top
Shipka, 12-02-2001 - 31-year-old Ivailo Gerdanov, bodyguard in the Playboy Night Club in the town of Shipka, was shot dead late last Saturday by Krassimir Karatsanov, sergeant from the Sliven Transport Police Department.
The incident occurred in front of the Asprovalta Night Club after fighting broke out between two of the club’s clients. After other clients interfered and the row died down, Toncho Lozanov, one of the participants in the fighting, started leaving, but was stopped by Ivailo Gerdanov who started beating him again. While onlookers were parting the two men who were apparently drunk, Karatsanov went home to take his gun and returned to the scene of the fighting where he shot Gerdanov in the stomach. The victim was taken to the Kazanlak hospital immediately, but died a couple of hours later without resuming consciousness.
Some sources reveal that there were no direct eyewitnesses to the shooting. Although Sergeant Karatsanov has been detained, he could be released if the magistrates judge that he was acting in self-defence. General Vassil Vassilev, director of the national police, has left for the town of Shipka to investigate the circumstances around the incident.
The shooting comes only 12 days after 16-year-old Eleonora Dimitrova died after police officer Kalin Kjosev shot her dead in a bizarre shooting incident in the centre of Sofia last month. Kalin Kjosev was drunk at the moment of the shooting (for more information, see Human rights news: January 2001). top