PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE IN PLOVDIV INITIATED INVESTIGATION INTO THE DEMOLITION OF SOME OF THE HISTORIC TOBACCO WAREHOUSES

A human chain of people stopped the demolition of a valuable architectural building in Bulgaria’s second largest city of Plovdiv. On 7th of March, a group of people expressed their discontent against the demolition of the iconic former Tobacco Warehouses and went to the municipal headquarters in Plovdiv where, on the steps, they piled bricks of the debris from the demolition site.

The owners of the former Tobacco Warehouses in the city of Plovdiv started demolishing one of the buildings on 6th of March, which was halted as a result of complaints by concerned members of the public.

Bulgaria’s Ministry of Culture launched an inspection into the demolition.

The prosecutor’s office in Plovdiv initiated an investigation and assigned economic police to check whether the procedures for issuing of permission for the demolition of the building were lawful.

Residents of Plovdiv and cultural activists insist the demolition be halted. Architects say that former tobacco warehouse has been a monument of culture since 1985 and its demolition was illegal.

The building in question had not been given protected status of a cultural monument because of a technical error in documentation. The error was already corrected by the National Institute of Immovable Cultural Heritage and the building was declared a monument of culture, the order for which was expected to be issued within the next few days.

Meanwhile the owners began demolition because of investment plans. The permit for construction of a new building in the place of the site was issued by Plovdiv’s chief architect Rumen Russev a year ago. He explained he had no legal reason to refuse the issuing of the demolition permit because he had a document from the Ministry of Culture saying it was not a monument of culture.

The municipality has halted the demolition and is inspecting the documents for construction

Svetlana Kuyumdzhieva, art director of Plovdiv 2019 Foundation, also expressed indignation, saying that this was the second time a historic tobacco warehouse had been sloped since preparations began for Plovdiv to be European Capital of Culture in 2019. “And at the same time, we are planning to launch an online platform with the history of Tobacco Town”, she added.

Valuable mural paintings by the artist Valchan Petrov were destroyed during the demolition. The author himself arrived at the site to see if it would be possible any of the paintings to be saved.

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