Bulgaria nationals sentenced in France over anti-Semitic vandalism tied to foreign interference
A French court on Friday jailed four Bulgarians for desecrating a Jewish memorial with red handprints last year, in what prosecutors believe may have been foreign interference linked to Russia.
The Paris criminal court sentenced Georgi Filipov and Kiril Milushev, identified as the perpetrators, to two years each, while Nikolay Ivanov and Mircho Angelov, considered the “masterminds” of the operation, received four years and three years respectively. Angelov is still at large.
All four were also banned from entering French territory for life.
The trial was the first of its kind in France, one of a series of similar crimes suspected of having been orchestrated by a foreign power with the aim to destabilize.
The four defendants were not tried for acting on behalf of a foreign power: that aggravating circumstance was only added to France’s criminal code after the incident took place.
However, the judges declared that the fact that foreign interference occurred was “indisputable,” and that it had been aimed to “stir up public opinion, exploit existing divisions and further fragment French society.”
The vandalism was staged during heightened tensions in France over the war between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas, which broke out in October 2023.
The wall defaced with red handprints lists 3,900 people honored for protecting Jews during the Nazi occupation of France in the Second World War.
Several other red handprints were found in nearby areas of central Paris.
The prosecutor’s office stated that a security agent had caught two people placing stencils on the memorial.
Investigators identified them using security footage and discovered that three had taken a bus to Belgium the next morning, followed by a flight to Bulgaria.
The defendants present were quick to blame their absent accomplice, labeling Angelov the “leader,” and denying any ideological motivation.
Filipov claimed he did not realize he was tagging the memorial, known as the “wall of the righteous.”
He also rejected accusations that his recruitment was related to his apparent neo-Nazi affiliations, including having a swastika tattoo and appearing in social media posts giving Nazi salutes.
He claimed to have left that behind, adding: “I’ve made bad choices in the past.”
The Paris prosecutor’s office said the red handprint incident, possibly “orchestrated by Russian intelligence services,” was one of nine such suspected acts of foreign interference.
Viginum, the French authority monitoring foreign interference online, stated that the red hand incident had been exploited by “actors linked to Russia” on X.
Head of Investigations
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