Bulgarian Interior Ministry adviser Plamen Stoilov Ferdov has worked for the Communist secret services known as the State Security (DS) and has had a joint business with Insa Oil owner Georgi Samuilov, who is said to be close to controversial lawmaker, oligarch and former media mogul Delyan Peevski.

According to data from the Files Commission, the body tasked with examining the Communist era secret documents, Ferdov has been a full-time employee of the State Security, Department Six (political sector), appointed as an intelligence officer by order № K-2938/28.08.1987. Plamen Ferdov’s father, Stoil Ferdov, has also worked for the State Security as a Deputy Head of Department Two (counterintelligence) and has taken a training course in the USSR. He was also Consul General in Minsk from 1989 to 1992.

In 1999, Plamen Ferdov and Georgi Samuilov became partners in the company Insa Trading, which trades petroleum products. Georgi Samuilov is a former director of the oil business of Multigroup and after the break-up of the conglomerate, he created Insa Oil, which has a refinery in the Bulgarian town of Rakovski. In fact, the original Insa company was founded in 1995, and Insa Oil appeared in 2001.

Insa Oil caused a stir after an operation of the National Service for Combatting Organized Crime (NSBOP) in March 2006, when anti-mafia policemen discovered counterfeit fuels worth over BGN 50 million. Samuilov then said he was a victim of a competition kompromat.

A month before the operation, Georgi Samuilov sold his shares in Insa Trading to Plamen Ferdov and Vasil Nikolov, according to documents in the Trade Register and was deleted as a partner in the company.

Prior to that, in 2005, Ferdov and Nikolov set up another company for the trade of petroleum products, called Insa Trade. The current owners of Insa Trade are Ferdov’s ex-wife Diana Belcheva and Maya Ushakova. In its strongest year, 2011, Insa Trade reported BGN 204,000 in net revenue from sales, which dropped to BGN 60,000 in 2020.

Reporters of BIRD.bg made an effort to contact Ferdov, the press center of the Ministry of Interior and personally Interior Minister Boyko Rashkov for a comment, but none of them answered the calls.

Peevski’s proxy and threats against journalist

In early January, BIRD published an investigation into the lobbying agreements of United States (US) lobbyist Anthony Podesta with Bulgarian businessmen linked to Peevski  who is sanctioned by the US under the global  Magnitsky Act. One of the contracts is with Georgi Samuilov’s company. Another USD 1.2 million contract has been signed with Veliko Zhelev of Hydrostroy. This agreement has not been declared in accordance with the requirements of the US Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). Apart from that, Podesta has a contract with arms trader Kiril Klenovski for lobbying in Riyadh and has opened a joint venture with the infamous lawyer Momchil Mondeshki, which indicates long-lasting interests in Bulgaria.

The business weekly Capital reported that according to numerous sources, a company, which bought properties worth millions from Peevski, is controlled by Samuilov. Among them is the iconic Berlin Hotel, where Peevski’s offices used to be located.

In June 2021, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned Peevski under the Magnitsky Act for his extensive role in corruption in Bulgaria. The State Department also publicly designated Peevski as a person involved in corruption.

Asked by a BIRD reporter by phone if he had a connection with Peevski, Samuilov said he had never met him, did not know him personally and had nothing to do with the company that bought the oligarch’s property.

During work on the investigation into Podesta’s contracts, BIRD editor-in-chief Atanas Tchobanov received information from the US embassy in Bulgaria about an “imminent threat” to his health and life. He informed the National Security Agency (DANS) and personally Prime Minister Kiril Petkov about the threat. Petkov ordered the secret services to check the information and neutralize the danger.

So far there are no results from the actions of these institutions, while the presence of a person with the biography of Plamen Ferdov in the close circle of the Interior Minister is rather a negative for such an investigation.

Change advised by State Security?

A few years ago, the investigative news site Bivol found that the closest person to Peevski, attorney Alexander Angelov is the son of Paraskev Paraskevov, a high-ranking State Security officer. It was Paraskevov who signed Peevski’s contracts with the lobbying company BGR Public Relations in the US. Another lawyer close to Peevski is Geno Andreev, son of the late Colonel Rumen Andreev, also a prominent officer of the State Security.

The Panama Papers and the Pandora Papers revealed that Angelov is the ultimate owner of key offshore companies through which Peevski operates. Therefore, if Delyan Peevski is removed, his business will remain in the hands of the heirs of key State Security officers who were colleagues of Ferdov’s father and supervisors of adviser Plamen Ferdov himself.

For several months now, since Boyko Rashkov took over the helm of the Interior Ministry, he had been working hard to investigate former Prime Minister Boyko Borisov but nothing similar had been observed with regard to the “iceberg of corruption” Delyan Peevski, who in the meantime acquired parliamentary immunity.

According to BIRD sources, the cover-up for Peevski is the deed of Ferdov as a key representative of the so-called “backstage rule” in the new government.

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