Sunny Beach is the battleground for Bulgarian government’s “war on noise”

Bulgaria’s Sunny Beach has become somewhat notorious as a summer party destination, but festival organisers fear events held at the beach resort might become victims of Deputy Prime Minister Valeri Simeonov’s “war on noise”.

Last week SOLAR Summer, a popular electronic music festival held for the past ten years at Sunny Beach, cancelled its 2017 edition over the nighttime raids that have plagued the resort in recent weeks.

According to a report by Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, earlier this month Mr Simeonov staged a series of raids on discos in Sunny Beach, later cautioning that he would extend the crackdown to other prominent Bulgarian tourist resorts.

The organisers of SOLAR Summer, Yalta Club, were particularly alarmed when the raids saw popular festival stalwart DJ Stancho arrested for refusing to hand his laptop over to police.

“We never imagined a situation in which a top artist could have his music stopped or equipment confiscated,” the festival organisers stated on their Facebook page, also voicing fears about the consequences of the raids for Bulgarian tourism. “In the age of social networks, such news will spread with the speed of light around the whole world, which will affect both our image and Bulgaria’s extremely badly.”

Source: Balkan Insight