Bulgaria’s prosecutor’s office said on July 20 that it has concluded its investigation into the collapse of the Corporate Commercial Bank (CCB) in 2014 and has filed a lawsuit in the specialised court that deals with high-profile corruption cases.

CCB, the county’s fourth-largest lender by assets at the time, asked to be put under special supervision of the Bulgarian National Bank (BNB) on June 20 2014, following a bank run. An audit several month later found that the bank held mainly impaired assets, requiring a write-down of 4.22 billion leva (about 2.16 billion euro), which led to CCB losing its banking licence in November 2014.

The prosecutors indicted 18 individuals as part of the investigation, starting with Tsvetan Vassilev, former majority shareholder and chief executive of CCB, who is currently in Serbia and has been successfully fighting off extradition requests lodged by Bulgarian prosecutors. Vassilev claims that the investigation against him is politically motivated and blamed the events that led to CCB’s insolvency on his former business associate Delyan Peevski, the controversial MP for the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF).

A number of former senior officials at the lender have been accused of being part of the organised crime group that Vassilev is alleged to have led and spearheaded. Some of them, but not all, are also facing embezzlement charges. Two auditors from KPMG Bulgaria are also facing embezzlement charges, while three former employees of the central bank – including former deputy governors in charge of bank supervision Tsvetan Gounev and Roumen Simeonov ­– have been indicted on charges of mismanagement.

Vassilev was indicted on a total of 146 counts. He and the other defendants are alleged to have embezzled a total 2.56 billion leva (about 1.31 billion euro), as well as 205.9 million leva in cash.

The prosecutor’s office statement said that its full bill of indictment and the evidence submitted to the court spanned more than 210 000 pages in 1360 volumes, including the results of questioning more than 400 witnesses and 90 forensic reports.

21 July 2017

The Sofia Globe

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