https://thinkprogress.org/viktoria-marinova-bulgarian-investigative-journalist-brutally-murdered-7ea85506c356/
Bulgarian investigative journalist Viktoria Marinova found brutally murdered in Ruse
Viktoria Marinova is the third reporter investigating corruption to be killed in the EU this year
Luke Barnes Oct 8, 2018, 9:53 am
A popular Bulgarian journalist, who reported on alleged corruption involving European Union funds, has been brutally raped and murdered in the town of Ruse, on the border with Romania.
The body of Viktoria Marinova, 30, was discovered in a park next to the River Danube on Saturday. According to the European Federation of Journalists Marinova had been beaten and strangled, and the attack was so vicious that she wasn’t able to be identified until Sunday night.
Bulgarian authorities have said that there is no indication yet that Marinova had been murdered because of he work. “It was about rape and murder,” Interior Minister Mladen Marinov told the Guardian. “The best criminologists were sent to Ruse, let’s not press them,” Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borissov added. “A large amount of DNA had been obtained.”
However, the owner of Bulgarian news site Bivol.bg, Asen Yordanov, said that the horrific slaying was almost certainly linked to her work.
"Viktoria’s death, the brutal manner in which she was killed, is an execution,” Yordanov said. “It was meant to serve as an example, something like a warning.” In the first episode of her new program, Marinova had interviewed Bivol journalist Dimitar Stoyanov about an investigation into “large-scale and widespread corruption” with EU-funded projects. Stoyanov had previously been arrested investigating the story and had reportedly faced threats for his reporting.
In the past year in the European Union, three journalists investigating corruption stories have been murdered.