Asen Vaskov Vasilev

Public record

Compiled from publications and official records as of 18.10.2026. Every statement links to its source; claims made by others are marked as such, with who makes them. Quotations in English are our translation.

Communist Party and State Security

• Family. A March 2013 article in 24 Chasa, when he was caretaker Minister of Economy and Energy, carries a photo captioned "Asen Vasilev with his father Vasko at his graduation in the USA" (our translation). — 24 Chasa, 16.03.2013
• His father. In a 2021 interview for the programme "Benovska Pita", also published on the Ministry of Finance website, Vasilev says: "I was born in Haskovo in 1977. My father worked in Haskovo, my mother in Dimitrovgrad. Both are engineers" (our translation). — Ministry of Finance, 2021, Skandalno, 29.09.2021
• His father and the Interior Ministry. It is claimed that Asen Vasilev's father was for some time head of KAT – Haskovo (Motor Transport Control, the traffic police of the Interior Ministry). As of 18.10.2026 we have not found a document or publication giving his name and post. Claims about the Interior Ministry also appear in publications. An author writing as "Razvigor Razkolnikov" refers in a January 2023 commentary on the XNEWS site to "Asen Vasilev, whose father is also from the structures of the Interior Ministry, especially in Haskovo" (our translation). Tsveta Kirilova, BZNS candidate for vice-president in the election of 25.10.2026, wrote on the site Zvanar in December 2025: "It is claimed in the public space that Asen Vasilev's father is a former head of the Haskovo police until 1992" (our translation). On Facebook in January 2026 she asked whether the father "before 10.10.1989 held the post of 'party secretary' in KAT Haskovo, a senior established officer post" (our translation). Vasilev himself describes his father as an engineer (see above). The question to him remains: did his father work in KAT – Haskovo, and was he secretary of the party organisation there? — XNEWS, 02.01.2023, Zvanar, 24.12.2025, Tsveta Kirilova, Facebook, January 2026, CEC decision No. 237-PVR

Russia

• Oil. In May 2022 Mediapool reported that Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Vasilev said on BNT that "without a derogation for Russian oil, Bulgaria will not support the new package of sanctions against Russia" (our translation). — Mediapool, 08.05.2022
• Patriarch Kirill. In June 2026 in the National Assembly, as leader of "We Continue the Change", Vasilev said of sanctions against the Russian Patriarch Kirill (Gundyaev): "It is quite reasonable for an employee of the Russian services to be put under sanctions, I see no problem with that" (our translation), and called him a KGB agent. — 24 Chasa, 17.06.2026
• Lukoil. In October 2023 Vasilev, as Minister of Finance, told the Financial Times in an interview that Lukoil had started a procedure to sell its refinery near Burgas, and said this was probably the result of the Bulgarian government's pressure on Russian companies. — Club Z, 17.10.2023
• Lukoil – the visit. In March 2023 GERB leader Boyko Borisov (a political opponent) claimed before supporters in Lovech: "Because Asen Vasilev has certainly been at Lukoil's headquarters as deputy prime minister, and we have a witness" (our translation). The Club Z publication is marked as paid. In February 2024 the chairman of the parliamentary energy committee, Delyan Dobrev (GERB), asked the deputy chairman of the refinery's supervisory board, Aleksandar Velichkov, whether he knew Vasilev, whether he had driven him in his private car and whether he had taken him to Lukoil's headquarters. Velichkov replied: "Yes, I know him. I have met him in his office and in the Council of Ministers" and "In September 2023 I did not drive Asen Vasilev in my private car anywhere" (our translation). — Club Z, 18.03.2023, Fakti, 14.02.2024

Corruption and scandals

• Varna. Plamenka Dimitrova, the owner of a catering firm and one of the prosecution's two key witnesses in the case against the mayor of Varna, Blagomir Kotsev, claims, in testimony cited by the prosecution in court, that 15% of a public contract was demanded from her: "The percentage was demanded by Asen Vasilev. From Nikolay Stefanov and Kateliev I learned that the money would be handed over to Asen Vasilev" (our translation). Vasilev states: "I have not taken money, nor has Blago Kotsev taken money, nor is the party financed this way" (our translation), and that he will sue Dimitrova for false accusation. — Sega, 12.07.2025
• The lawsuit. In July 2025 Asen Vasilev filed a civil defamation suit against Plamenka Dimitrova claiming BGN 15,000 in compensation, and filed a complaint with the prosecutor's office against her for false accusation. He called her statements "false, defamatory, insulting and incriminating claims" (our translation). — RFE/RL, 29.07.2025
• Insa Oil. Georgi Samuilov, director of the fuel company Insa Oil, against which a cartel investigation had been opened, claims in a complaint of March 2022 that after a meeting on 5 January 2022 Vasilev, then Minister of Finance, asked him to tell Boyko Borisov and Delyan Peevski to give up politics, and that after he refused, inspections of the company by customs, the tax agency and the State Reserve became more frequent. The prosecution, then headed by chief prosecutor Ivan Geshev, opened an investigation; the Sofia City Prosecutor's Office terminated it in August 2023: the check could not establish whether such a meeting took place, and the supervising prosecutor concluded that even if it had, this was not pressure, and that the inspections were made during a fuel crisis and not only against this company. — RFE/RL, 11.12.2023
• STV Consulting. According to 24 Chasa, the Supreme Court of Cassation took a final decision in the insolvency proceedings of STV Consulting, setting 31.12.2020 as the start date of the insolvency; at that date Asen Vasilev was the firm's sole owner. — 24 Chasa, 15.05.2026
• The offshore company. BIRD claims that according to an extract from the register of the British Virgin Islands Financial Services Commission, the latest change in the ownership of the offshore company Axelbert (Akselbert Ltd) was Vasilev's acquisition of its shares in 2016 (per the Trade Register: 100%, 50,000 shares, on 14.10.2016), and that he has signed declarations stating that he does not own it: in 2021 as caretaker Minister of Finance, as an MP, and twice as Minister of Finance. The Ministry of Finance replied to a BIRD inquiry (25.09.2023) that Vasilev is not a representative and not the owner of Axelbert EOOD; BIRD calls this reply untrue according to the available official records. — BIRD, 25.01.2024
• The property deals. The civic association BOEC referred Asen Vasilev and Daniel Lorer to the prosecutor's office over information from Bird.bg about two property deals concluded in early September 2023. According to Bird.bg, as cited by Mediapool, the larger deal was by a former firm of Vasilev with frozen accounts, and the buyer was a firm of Stanislava Arnaudova, owner of "Intelligent Traffic Systems", the main intermediary in the sale of road vignettes, with a 7% commission. Mediapool writes that the question is whether the deals hide "a concealed scheme to benefit people in power" (our translation). According to Mediapool, the Bird.bg piece expressly stresses that the property sales themselves are not illegal. — Mediapool, 12.01.2024
• An appointment in Haskovo. In April 2024 caretaker Interior Minister Kalin Stoyanov told the temporary parliamentary committee investigating corrupt practices in the Customs Agency and the possible role of Asen Vasilev in them that Vasilev had told him he had a person he could rely on – Nedan Hadzhiev – and had asked him why he did not appoint him at the Haskovo regional police directorate. Stoyanov confirmed that this was the only appointment Vasilev had proposed to him. Before the same committee Stoyanov was also asked about his acquaintance with Stefan and Marin Dimitrov, arrested on suspicion of a smuggling ring; according to Mediapool, Boyko Rashkov claims Stoyanov was a frequent guest of the arrested man. — Maritsa, 11.04.2024, Mediapool, 11.04.2024
• The Danish investors. In July 2021 Trud reported that investors from Denmark, former business partners of Vasilev, claim he defrauded them by selling software code to a Chinese company without their knowledge, and that their joint company was declared bankrupt in the United Kingdom. Among the investors in his company Everbread Limited is Morten Lund, who told bTV: "He is a fraudster, but very, very clever" and that Vasilev "together with a few programmers took the code, went to China and sold it to the Chinese government" (our translation). Vasilev categorically denied this on bTV. — Trud, 31.07.2021
• "The unknown MP". In September 2025 Capital (Polina Paunova) wrote that for a year the prosecution had been trying without success to link the PP leader to various "organised criminal groups" and "corruption mega-scandals", calling him "an unknown MP" in its rulings, while not asking for his immunity to be lifted (our translation). — Capital, 18.09.2025