SOFIA: A Bulgarian man fighting extradition to France for defacing the Paris Holocaust memorial in May denied Wednesday that he had acted out of racial motives, telling AFP it was “just hooliganism.”
France issued European arrest warrants for three Bulgarians after red hands were painted on the Paris Holocaust Memorial’s Wall of the Righteous, which lists 3,900 people honored for protecting Jews during the Nazi occupation of France in World War II.
Two Bulgarians, identified by a Sofia court as 35-year-old Georgi Filipov and 27-year-old Kiril Milushev, were detained in the Bulgarian capital in July. A third suspect was detained in Croatia.
A Sofia court on Wednesday held a hearing on whether Filipov should be extradited to France, but postponed a decision until September 26.
“I took part in this but not in the sense that they say in the media, it had nothing to do with chauvinism, racism or anything else of the sort,” Filipov told AFP before the hearing.
“I have nothing against anyone there, or the buildings. I had simply drunk a lot of alcohol. This was just hooliganism,” he said.
He told AFP that he had planned to go to Paris “to see the Eiffel tower.”
“We were a bunch of drunk people, someone proposed to do something like that and I didn’t refuse, which I regret.”
He insisted he “had no idea whatsoever” what the red hands symbolize, adding that he had no alternative to running away after coming to his “senses the next day.”
On Monday, a regional court ordered the extradition of Milushev to France.
Bulgaria’s state security agency (SANS) said in July that the suspects “are known to gravitate around Bulgarian groups that profess far-right extremist ideology” and the agency is working to identify the instigators of the May 14 vandalism.
French prosecutors are investigating the men for participating in a criminal group to prepare a crime as well as damaging a protected historical building for national, ethnic, racial or religious motives.
Bulgaria suspect in Paris Holocaust memorial defacement denies racial motives
https://arab.news/m3ygg
Bulgaria suspect in Paris Holocaust memorial defacement denies racial motives
- France issued European arrest warrants for three Bulgarians after red hands were painted on the Paris Holocaust Memorial’s Wall of the Righteous
- Two Bulgarians, identified by a Sofia court as 35-year-old Georgi Filipov and 27-year-old Kiril Milushev, were detained in the Bulgarian capital in July
Russia says captured Ukraine’s Siversk in key eastern region
- The Russian army in Ukraine is “confidently advancing along the entire front,” Putin said
- He said last month his troops were advancing on Siversk, home to around 11,000 residents
MOSCOW: Russia said Thursday its troops had seized full control of Siversk, a Ukrainian city in the eastern Donetsk region where fighting has intensified in recent weeks, though Ukraine denied the key settlement had been lost.
The Russian army has been slowly but steadily grinding through eastern Ukraine and taking ground from outnumbered and outgunned Ukrainian forces, with some of the fiercest battles taking place in Donetsk.
Russia’s military chief of staff, Valery Gerasimov, said Moscow’s forces had captured Siversk in a report to President Vladimir Putin during a televised meeting with army commanders.
The Russian army in Ukraine is “confidently advancing along the entire front,” Putin said, thanking the commanders and soldiers “for their combat work.”
Putin said last month his troops were advancing on Siversk, home to around 11,000 residents before the war, claiming that the Russian offensive was “practically impossible to hold back.”
The Ukrainian army’s eastern command denied Russian claims it had taken Siversk, saying that it “remains under the control of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.”
“The enemy is trying to infiltrate Siversk in small groups, taking advantage of unfavorable weather conditions but most of these units are being destroyed on the approaches,” it added in a Facebook post.
Siversk is located about 30 kilometers (18 miles) east of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk, the last two major cities still under Ukrainian control in the Donbas — an industrial and mining region in Moscow’s sights.
Moscow earlier this month said it had captured Pokrovsk, a former road and rail hub also in Donetsk, but Kyiv claims fighting in the city is still ongoing.
Putin has said that Moscow is ready to fight on to seize the rest of the land it claims in eastern Ukraine if Kyiv does not give it up as part of a peace deal.
Eastern Ukraine has been ravaged since Russia launched its assault in February 2022, with tens of thousands of people killed and millions forced to flee their homes.
