Former secret services and especially former intelligence members are holding Bulgaria in their arms, German investigative journalist Juergen Roth said.

The intelligence exercised its most noticeable control over the economy, Roth told Deutsche Welle Radio.

All statements that organised crime in Bulgaria was under control and that grey business was gradually becoming legal were ridiculous, he said.

According to the German journalist Bulgaria’s secret services keep their close ties with Russian intelligence.

Roth said that some documents he had seen and several meetings with journalists and prosecutors convinced him that Russian mafia was interested in Bulgaria’s coastal city of Varna. A gang descending from the Soviet military intelligence was acting in the city.

The big number of public murders showed that the organised crime was still poorly consolidated.

EU may congratulate Bulgaria for approving a number of laws, but even the best laws were useless when they should be implemented by unreliable people, Roth said.