The former mayor of Tsarevo, Petko Arnaudov, has been appointed director of the State Forestry Company in Tsarevo, OFFnews reported.
Arnaudov was appointed by the director of the Southeastern State Forestry Company Peicho Varbanov (a former employee of the State Security agency, known as ‘agent Gora’; Arnaudov himself is also a former State Security agent, known as ‘Ivanov’). His profession is forestry, and before becoming a mayor, he had worked as chief engineer in the local State Forestry Company, and in other Forestry Companies in the region, Arnaudov said. “I was not promoted as director when UDF (Union of Democratic Forces, 1997-2001) was in power because I was politically inconvenient. I should say that I had two better offers then, but I preferred to stay here, in Tsarevo”, the former mayor told Offnews, adding that he took now the director position without public competition, as the procedure is not required for the appointment of heads of forestry and hunting companies.
Arnaudov, who is a BSP (Bulgarian Socialist Party) cadre, spent three mandates as mayor of the Black Sea coast town of Tsarevo. His name became known due to the illegal construction of the Golden Pearl complex.
In complete disregard of the protected status of the Black Sea coast south of Varvara village, Arnaudov pushed a change in the master plan of Tsarevo, allowing the construction of a new coastal resort for tens of thousands tourists. The author of the plan was the notorious architect Kalin Tiholov who was nominated for a cabinet minister in the current government and was withdrawn a day later, due to his poor reputation.
With the intention to remove all obstacles to the new master plan (a plan that triggered an infringement procedure against Bulgaria by the EU) and to promote the illegal Golden Pearl construction, Mayor Arnaudov demanded the closing down of the whole Strandja Nature Park, challenging the act assigning its protected status. In 2007, the Supreme Administrative Court (which had created a precedent of changing the protected status of another similar territory, Kamchiyski Piasaci), was about to cancel the status of the Strandja Nature Park. Thanks to vocal environmental protests, the Parliament voted a ban on delisting of existing protected nature territories, thus limiting the powers of the judiciary, but saving hundreds of parks, conservatories, protected areas and national landmarks from irresponsible investors.
