More ski lifts on Vitosha

Vitosha is the mountain overlooking Sofia. On it, there are already a number of Ski lifts, but the company running the business (Vitosha Ski) have now admitted a new plan for legal approval. The new plan suggests 7 times more Ski lifts, and 260 hectares of protected land exploited.





Picture from wikipedia commons. Lincense: Creative Commons Attribution 2.0

This amount of ski pists involves numerous other installations, such as parking lots, an artificial lake for artificial snow for artificial skiing in artificial winters etc.

The investors have used a Gallup poll, to find that the Sofia population favours "clean paths" on Vitosha, whatever that means. The documents have not been published online but have been written about on e-vestnik.bg and the blog Spasi Vitosha (Save Vitosha).

Potential critics, like environmentalists or organisations representing other mountain activities than skiing, (e.g. hiking) have not been invited to comment on the plan. but they do, on the internet.


Sources : @zelenite

Hungarian cop's go ultra-right wing

The Hungarian trade union Tettrekesz, organizing policemen, have signed a statement of collaboration with the exreme right wing party Jobbik, known for antisemitism, antiroma activities and general fascism.

Jobbik are likely to get four seats in the Euopean parliament. In exchange for the fourth position on the party's list, and possibly one of these seats, for Tettrekesz chairman Judit Szima, the trade union declare their support for the party's politics in "police matters". Fascists tend to regard most things as police matters...

Higher authorities are not so pleased, and have kindly asked the trade union to refrain from the competition.

The news reached me through the Romanian paper/site Cotidianul, which of course loves to find scandals in Bulgaria or evenmore in Hungary.

Who killed Metodi Marinov?

That's the question Bulgaria e nasha asks in a post today.

 On the blog two conflicting versions of Metodi's death the night between 14th and 15th of January are stated.

1. Metodi came to the police station by free will. there he confessed to stealing a car together with two more men. He was taken to custody. There hw took his life. The night shift guard visited him after hearing a loud sound, but it was too late to save his life.This version is the official, delivered by the police authorities.
2. Metodi was arrested in connection with the protests in central Sofia 14th of January. he said that he didn't feel well and suffered from cardiac problems, but was denied medical help.This version allegedly come from eye witnesses, and was forwarded at a special conference aranged by the opposition party DSB. the police admitt that Metodi declared his health problems, but say thathe refused help.
   

Unlike their Bulgarian collegues, Swedish policemen have been caught on tape calling immigrant potential rioters monkeys, and say that they're going to beat them so that they vcan't stand straight.

Police misuse of force like this is of course a disgraceto democracy.

Security measures for tomorrow

The organizers of tomorrows protest expect 5000 protesters. If this is the case, tomorrows demonstration will be the biggest so far.

The police will deploy 1800 policemen. Besides guarding the parliament they will set up control points for people passing in and out. These are to be manned by policemen and respesentatives for the protestors.

The protesters will also asign a number of civilian guards, that will help the police to mintain law and order.

Source: Darik news

If this works out according to the plan it's a great thing. Everyone have everything to win from a big peaceful demonstration.