Podcast in English
Text size
Bulgarian National Radio © 2024 All Rights Reserved

No arrests have been made following last night's violent protest in front of the National Theater

Photo: BTA

No arrests have been made for last night's riots in front of the Ivan Vazov National Theater in Sofia during a protest against the new prodution "Guns and the Man", directed by John Malkovich. This was announced to BNT by the Minister of Internal Affairs, Atanas Ilkov. 

At a briefing, he described the response of the police as quick, adequate and immediate. 60 riot police officers were sent to the scene, although the Sofia Directorate for Internal Affairs had no information about provocations involving football hooligans. 


Today, the prosecutor's office assigned the Sofia Directorate for Internal Affairs to identify the violators of the order, and they have already been identified. When asked why there were no arrests after protesters attacked theater director Vasil Vasilev, animator Teodor Ushev and actor Vladimir Penev, the police explained that in such a situation the goal is first to "tame the tension" and then proceed to arrest.

According to the Sofia Directorate for Internal Affairs, there was no way to make a cordon last night so that the spectators with tickets could enter the theater, as there were provocateurs among them. "I thank my colleagues for doing a great job, for not allowing the escalation of tension, for not taking actions to detain persons in the situation in which the tension was escalating, because then you would have asked questions: "How exactly did you allow the center of Sofia to bleed in front of the National Theater?", said the director of the Metropolitan Directorate of Internal Affairs, Lyubomir Nikolov.

A protest and a counter-protest are planned for this evening in front of the National Theater.



Последвайте ни и в Google News Showcase, за да научите най-важното от деня!
Listen to the daily news from Bulgaria presented in "Bulgaria Today" podcast, available in Spotify.

More from category

Interim minister of the Interior Atanas Ilkov

Bulgaria's full Schengen membership will not open the floodgates to the EU, says Interior Minister

A quadripartite meeting of the interior ministers of Bulgaria, Hungary, Austria and Romania in Budapest on 22 November made it clear that Austria would lift its veto and that Bulgaria and Romania would probably become full members of Schengen from the..

published on 11/23/24 11:58 AM

President Rumen Radev meets the Bulgarian community in Singapore

President Rumen Radev met with Bulgarians living and working in Singapore during his visit to the Asian country on November 22-24. There are an estimated 400 Bulgarians living in Singapore. "Our diaspora in Singapore occupies a very special..

published on 11/23/24 10:07 AM

Sunny yet cold weather expected on Saturday

The weather on Saturday will be mostly sunny over most of Bulgaria. There will be considerable clouds in eastern Bulgaria before midday and rainfall is expected in the eastern areas, but precipitation will stop also there and clouds will break...

published on 11/22/24 7:35 PM