Internet is fast and popular in Bulgaria, and thanks to weak regulations, the market for internet services has developed rapidly in the last 10 years. The country ranked third in the world for internet speeds for customers in 2011, although by 2014 it had dropped to 20th place. An analysis of who owns Bulgaria’s internet service providers (ISPs) shows that the sector is generally clean and not infiltrated by organized crime figures or corrupt politicians. But fears are growing that a wealthy Russian businessman with close ties to the Kremlin is seeking to control Vivacom, the biggest and most strategic Bulgarian […]
Tsvetan Vassilev, a fugitive Bulgarian banker currently wanted by Interpol, used to own a lot of companies in Bulgaria, among them the country’s biggest telecom, Vivacom, and the television station TV7. When he went on the lam, officials of a company called LIC 33 (it stands for Louvrier Investment Company) held a news conference in March of this year to say they had bought up all his properties for the symbolic sum of € 1. The company is managed by Russian-Belgian businessman Pierre Louvrier, pictured below in his Facebook account with Igor Strelkov, the former defense minister of the separatists in Donetsk, […]
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