10 Officials of Automobile Administration Agency Detained over Corruption

More than 10 employees of the Executive Agency “Automobile Administration“ in the city of Blagoevgrad were arrested in an anticorruption operation carried out by the Specialised Prosecutior’s Office and the chief directorate for combatting organized crime on 24^th of April.

They were taken to the police station in the city. The Specialised Prosecutor's Office said the arrests were made over bribing accusations. The detained officials allegedly demanded between 300 and 600 euros from hauliers. At this stage, however, the authorities refused to say whether the alert for the corrupt officials was filed by the hauliers or not.

Petar Belchev, Prosecutor, explained thjat this was allegedly an organised criminal group of officials from the regional department "Automobile Administration" in Blagoevgrad. They asked for and received sums of money in the form of a bribe from representatives of haulier businesses in order to not issue penalties to offenders from the hauliers, he added.

For the time being it not known for how long the officials of the automobile agency have been monitored and how much money they received per day or month. The detained will be interviewed. The investigation is likely to last until later today. It is not known whether all detainees will be charged.