Bulgaria's vigilante migrant 'hunter'

A Bulgarian trader in spare parts for buses has become a national celebrity after starting to patrol the Turkish border "hunting" for migrants. Many Bulgarians applaud his vigilante initiative, though others are deeply troubled.

"Bulgaria needs people like me, dignified Bulgarians, willing to defend their homeland," says Dinko Valev, sipping a fresh-squeezed orange juice in a flashy cafe in his hometown, Yambol, 50km (30 miles) from Bulgaria's border with Turkey.

Valev, 29, is a beefy semi-professional wrestler with a shaved head and a brusque manner.

 His left pectoral is tattooed with a cross the size of a T-bone steak. He became famous overnight last month when national television news carried a report labelling him a "superhero" and detailing a violent encounter with a group of Syrians near the border as he was out riding on his quad bike.

The presenter praised Valev for subduing the group of 12 Syrian men, three women and a child "with his bare hands".

They can be seen on mobile phone footage filmed by one of Valev's companions, lying on the ground waiting for police to arrive.

Valev can be heard insulting the refugees and saying that they came from Syria "to kill us like dogs".

"These are disgusting and bad people and they should stay where they are," Valev tells me in the cafe.
He estimates that 95% of Bulgarians support him, describing the migrants as dangerous "terrorists, jihadists and Taliban".

"Bulgaria is an unfenced yard and is completely disorganised," he says, reflecting a lack of confidence in government that many Bulgarians share.  In fact, the Bulgarian government has built a fence along about half of the Turkish border, and is now seeking to lengthen it.

 Valev has used his new-found fame to call for volunteers to join him on a border patrol. On 12 March, he says, some 50 unarmed people gathered to look for migrants along the forested border, on quad bikes and jeeps.


But a large group of border police were waiting when they arrived. According to Valev they were deliberately scaring away migrants to prevent the vigilantes catching any. The time and place of future patrols, he says, will not be publicly announced.

Border police spokeswoman, Lora Lyubenova, says the authorities welcome information from citizens about criminal activity - including illegal border crossings - but that only the police have the authority to detain and arrest people.

Last year more than a million people used the "Western Balkan route" to enter the European Union though only 90,000 are known to have entered Bulgaria.