Analyses & Alternatives: Russia's Security Council to decide on turning the Kamchia resort complex into an outpost of Russia's 'soft power'.
The answer created tectonics in Bulgaria.
As is often the case, the media reported the news, but most did not get behind the story, cover the context, or offer an analysis of the consequences. The Bulgarian public was left on its own to navigate between the full spectrum of reactions - from the cry "horror" to the "nothing special" version. Most of the political news related to Russia, unfortunately, begin and end confined to their PR dimension, oscillating between emotional extremes. Lavrov knows this and uses it to foster his propaganda.
To begin with, Senator Ikonnikov, who is a representative of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, does not improvise in asking this question not only because he is in charge of overseeing relations with Bulgaria at the Higher Chamber of the Federal Assembly. He voices an initiative that, in all likelihood, have been brought up by Bulgarian associates in the Kamchia project, desperate to find funding.
In line with routine practice, Ikonnikov's question to Lavrov and his proposal has been cleared and coordinated in advance between the Federal Assembly, the Foreign Ministry, and the Security Council, and only then it has received publicity.
In any case, the Russian foreign minister deliberately makes a calculated move that aims to cause a storm and put Bulgaria into a tailspin of soul searching and mutual incriminations between pro and anti-Russian circles.
The usual plan is to try to expose and profit from vulnerabilities in the Bulgarian society when it comes to reaching minimum consensus on how to cope with Moscow. Lavrov is directly talking to NATO, and the EU, denigrating the added value of Bulgaria as a member state, demonstrating Russia's extensive resource base to shape events and politicians in the country.
This political prose of Lavrov belongs to the same doctrinal matrix as the infamous "Trojan horse' epithet used by Ambassador Chizhov 12 years ago to describe Kremlin's control over the country.
From time to time, Moscow chooses to parade its dominance over Bulgarian politics and top politicians, reminding them of the limitations on their freedom of action and continuous dependencies.
One more example of this classic imperial hubris is the quotes from Putin, made public by the leader of the Bulgarian Russophiles Nikolay Malinov. The Russian president warned the Bulgarian authorities not to take on Malinov because he is Kremlin's man. Neither the Bulgarian president nor the prime minister, the foreign minister or the chief prosecutor dared to resort to even the safest routine reaction of the type "Bulgaria and its justice system cannot and will not be influenced by political statements by foreign leaders." They opted instead to keep mute to this day - humiliated, suppressed, exhibiting an inferiority complex.
Sergei Lavrov's statement is more of a political declaration than a pragmatic act seeking to accomplish the goal of turning the Kamchia complex into an EU center of Russia's "soft" power. He is, in effect, promoting the so-called 'humanitarian dimension' in Russia's hybrid warfare against NATO and the EU.
The sheer fact of referring to the need to set up a "humanitarian" center implies that Bulgaria is a humanitarian case. Lavrov also points to the commitment by Russia to use humanitarian channels to influence events in the Balkan and Black sea region.
One can only wonder whether it is the right time to promote the compassionate nature of Russia's foreign policy with the mass airstrike of Russian planes in Syria, taking a heavy death toll on civilians and generating hordes of immigrants. Lavrov is mindful of this fact, yet he chooses to deliver the same line with the humanitarian center as an embodiment of Russian omnipotence and soft power.
The humanitarian center analogs in Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina offer fresh evidence of the discrepancy between the generosity and compassion in form and the aggressive nature in content when using humanitarian verbiage to promote Russian strategic interests.
The sense of fervor that transcends Lavrov's comments reaches new heights with the revelation that the fate of a tourist complex in Bulgaria is moving up the hierarchy of importance to the top-level involving President Putin and the Security Council of Russia. Such elevation in priorities will shift the focus from the trade, economic, and cultural perspective to the strategic and military value of the resort complex.
Let's briefly recall the background to the story.
The idea of a dedicated tourist complex was launched by members of the former Communist party top nomenclature, who succeeded in selling the concept to the former mayor of Moscow Yuri Luzhkov. At the start, things looked bright - Russia did not have access to Crimea and was short of tourist camps for children. It seemed at the time that the Kamchia complex could become a prime recreational base for kids from Moscow schools, as part of the mayor's social programs and the budget of the Russian capital.
As the Bulgarian "partners" in the project had neither the resources nor the skills to turn it into a successful business project, they kept it the line that it should serve Russian kids exclusively. The final product proved to be deviating from the initial concept as it added some higher class accommodation and amenities, including facilities for Congressional tourism. Finally, Moscow's budget money helped build an oversized mixed product, which targeted different clientele with uncertain long-term revenue projections.
Few people thought of the underlying and dormant potential strategic threats, which remained in the distant background. In contrast, the leading newswire was full of stories on the tense relations between Yuri Luzhkov and the Kremlin.
Even with the signing of the agreement that defined the project's status in September 2008 by the then Social Minister Emilia Maslarova, it became clear that - this a project with substantial political risk, in a permanent and dire need of massive subsidies from Moscow's budget. Amid signs of growing strain between the Kremlin and Moscow City Hall this meant one thing - it won't be long before the Kremlin replaces Luzhkov, and the Kamchia project enters into a terminal existential down spiral.
The crisis period in the operation of the Kamchia complex directly relates to the time after September 2010, when Luzhkov was fired due to "loss of trust" in him by then-President Medvedev.
The acute phase of the crisis hit in 2015, after the annexation of Crimea, and the demise of the South Stream project. Subsidies from the federal and Moscow's budget drastically changed direction and were rerouted to serve the development of tourism on the Crimean peninsula. About $ 6 billion a year, Russia spent in Crimea, with the Moscow city budget playing a significant role.
Just a year after was removed from the mayor's office, Yuri Luzhkov sought asylum abroad and declared himself politically repressed. The new mayor-elect in 2013, Sergei Sobyanin, shut down most of Luzhkov's projects, and the Kamchia complex topped the list.
The attempt to find an alternative use and new owner came to a logical end - federal funds to save the complex from bankruptcy and retain ownership for the Russian state.
Foreign Minister Lavrov's 'soft power' interlude and the idea to resort to national security grounds will suggest a decision by the Security Council of the Russian Federation. There is little doubt it will be taken once included in the agenda at one of the forthcoming meetings.
Bulgaria can hardly hope to control the verbal extremes of Russian politicians. It can, however, be in charge of its actions that will make Kremlin's free ride on Bulgarian territory impossible.
The problem with the growing Russian influence in Bulgaria is not limited to the Kamchia center. The government has completely let its guard down and has allowed Russian agents of influence and various secret services to operate freely in this country. Therefore, the imaginary 'humanitarian center' should not be the lead news story, but rather the systematic problem of doing little or nothing to avoid the traps Moscow has set that deepen the dependencies and expose the vulnerabilities in the Bulgarian institutions.
Let's revisit some basics in understanding Russian foreign policy towards Bulgaria. For the Kremlin, Bulgaria remains a proxy state with limited sovereignty. Moscow rationale is simple - if Sofia does not spin in its orbit, i.e., it is not part of the Russian world. It will downgrade it to a failed state status, thus denying the EU and NATO any added value from its membership.
It's no secret that many Russian officials reacted painfully to the news that Bulgaria has allowed a NATO Coordination Center in Varna. This story is an old commitment taken during previous high-level NATO meetings. However, a fortnight ago, apparently under pressure from Russia, Prime Minister Borisov took a step back, changing the status of this commitment from 'certain' to "probable." One can easily imagine another vintage case of Bulgaria's Prime Minister 'balancing art' licensing the use of the Kamchia complex as a European outpost of Kremlin's influence - to keep both the Americans and the Russian 'happy'.
Such a reading is too far fetched and extravagant for PM Borisov. The concept of a new humanitarian center "Kamchia Complex" should be understood in the broader and much more controversial context of the gradual upscaling of Russia's control over the coastline of Bulgaria. Few Bulgarians grasp the fallout from the growing Russification of their country and the fact that between May and September, there are more Russian speakers in the country than the Turkish and Roma minorities.
I have watched 'live' the Russification of Crimea before its annexation - during my tenure as Bulgaria's ambassador to Russia and can pledge with certainty - this was not a natural evolutionary process, but rather a conscientious policy line, systematically implemented and well funded. Russia has been stepping up its economic presence, Russian oligarchs and middle-class citizens, encouraged by the Kremlin, often credited by the closest to the Kremlin banks, have essentially 'bought out' Crimea. To get to 2014, when this carefully and clandestinely built network of strongholds of Russian influence was mobilized, and Kyiv found out it has no means to resist.
If one juxtaposes the Crimean picture onto Bulgaria - the similarities would be striking. According to the Bulgarian ambassador to Moscow, over 300 thousand Russian citizens own property, while over 500 thousand visit the country annually. Instead of being concerned, he is proud of the fact.
Russian Ambassador Makarov adds to the picture that Russian real estate investments in Bulgaria top 3 billion dollars, mostly along the Black Sea coast.
The situation in Bulgaria bears scary analogies with Crimea, Georgia, Ukraine, Moldova. In addition to the Russian secret agents' network, there are paramilitary groups trained by former Russian military personnel, controlled by the GRU, operating unchecked. A growing segment of the tourism business in Bulgaria, including apartment hotels and hotels, is owned by Russian businessmen accommodating almost exclusively Russian tourists.
In 2016 the Russian Parliamentarian Pyotr Tolstoy shocked Bulgaria with the revelation: "We will just buy out the entire [Bulgaria]. Half of its coastline we have already bought. " The Bulgarian Government remained mute and took no action.
Most of these properties belong to Russian politicians, security officers, and business people with close ties to the Kremlin, which allows their unrestricted use by Russian intelligence services and diplomatic agents. The Russian Consul General in Varna and the Honorary Consul in Burgas, as well as the Lukoil-Neftochim based Agentur, supervise the overall operations.
Russian companies and banks, directly and indirectly, control over 30 percent of Bulgaria's GDP, with Lukoil Neftochim's share in Burgas exceeding 15 percent.
Yet the picture is not terminally bleak, and Bulgaria is not doomed. Whatever Lavrov generates as messages are pure scare tactics, intent on stunning the victim and leave speechless. The Russian state, under the current wave of new EU and US sanctions, is unable to decide on its own what will happen to the Kamchia complex, regardless of any decision taken at the highest security level - the Security Council in Russia.
Any plan to turn the Kamchia Complex into a Nish-type humanitarian base, following a similar case in Serbia by an intergovernmental agreement - IGA, ratified by the National Assembly.
The issue at stake is that despite the lack of a proper legal base, many Russian real estate projects enjoy informal extraterritoriality, as the case is with the oil refinery in Burgas. It is therefore not inconceivable that the Kremlin could seek and receive a tacit 'off-limits' status for the Kamchia property by the Bulgarian authorities.
Russia has been continuously expanding the list of diplomatic properties across Bulgaria, using private channels - proxies buying business assets, then transferring them to different institutions of the Russian state, increasing the network of bases for potential agents.
Bulgaria has many options to pre-empt a hostile act by Russia, should it pursue the conversion of the Kamchia complex into a strategic outpost. The government could block the transactions and initiate a forced sale of the property for unpaid taxes to the municipal and state budgets.
It is also likely that Bulgarian oligarchs, close to the Kremlin, could be used to cover the debts of Moscow while acting as their representatives in disguise. Sergei Lavrov understands that ownership and operational freedom are two different leagues.
Once again, Sofia should not be concerned, even less so afraid, of statements made in Moscow by Russia's top politicians. The genuine problem is the loopholes in its defense shield and the lack of a systematic approach and a strategic vision on the overall blend of threats, risks, and challenges posed by the Kremlin, which are incompatible with the EU and NATO membership.
No matter how good at balancing the interests of the great powers PM Borisov is, as a disciple of the Todor Zhivkov, his maneuvering space continues to shrink and is bound to disappear shortly. Sooner rather than later, the Bulgarian political establishment will have to confront Russia's assertiveness and reclaim its sovereignty and control over Bulgaria's economy and coastline.
If the Belarussian leader Lukashenko has risen to this level of reasoning that Moscow is a threat, the Bulgarian leaders should follow suit.
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