At the entrance to the Kresna Gorge, just after Simitli, a newly erected billboard displays the faces of individuals who, for over two decades, have blocked the completion of the "Struma" Highway through the gorge using legal and administrative maneuvers. These individuals are former Minister of Environment Borislav Sandov, his deputy Toma Belev, and their chief advisor during their tenure at the Ministry of Environment and Water, Andrey Kovachev.
Over the past 20 years, this short 16-kilometer section has seen 74 fatalities, over 400 injuries, and damage to the state and society amounting to hundreds of millions of leva. Traffic congestion, driver frustration, and environmental harm have also significantly increased. This is the result of efforts by green non-governmental organizations (NGOs) funded by foreign and European sources to sabotage the project.
Since 2004, when the highway was supposed to be completed, environmentalists have initiated over 50 lawsuits in various jurisdictions and courts to halt the nationally significant project. With few exceptions, they have lost these cases. Despite this, the greens managed to delay the project so much that the highway is now expected to be completed no earlier than 2029-2030, nearly 30 years after its original deadline—assuming no further blockages by environmentalists.
During this time, they persistently lobbied for a Swiss company proposing a tunnel with two 16-kilometer tubes at a cost of €2 billion. The total cost over the 10-year construction period remains uncertain. In addition to the price, building a tunnel in the most seismically active zone of Southeast Europe, involving the excavation and removal of 6 million tons of radioactive rock, is deemed entirely unfeasible by geodesy experts.
In the past year alone, the individuals featured on the billboard and their NGOs have filed 14 lawsuits against Bulgarian state institutions, including the Road Infrastructure Agency, the Ministry of Environment, and other agencies involved in the project’s implementation. Although the courts have dismissed these complaints one after another, the greens persistently appeal at every level, hoping to find a sympathetic judge. Fortunately, they have succeeded only once.
Due to environmentalists and stringent ecological requirements, the "Struma" Highway route from Kulata to Sofia has been rerouted to bypass the Kresna Gorge and will now traverse the slopes of the Pirin Mountains. However, this does not satisfy the environmentalists. Although the highway will have lanes totaling 10.5 meters in one direction and include three-lane sections with emergency pull-offs for safety, the greens remain dissatisfied, claiming it is effectively a secondary road and unnecessary. They continue to oppose every alternative project except the tunnel, from which they have significant financial interests.
Their primary motivation is financial commissions, not environmental protection. The current situation, with thousands of cars stuck in traffic in the Kresna Gorge, emitting smoke, exhaust fumes, and dust, is far more harmful to the environment and to the flora and fauna.
Unfortunately, the green lobbying interests affect not only the "Struma" Highway but also other major infrastructure projects such as the "Black Sea" Highway, the "Shipka" and "Petrohan" tunnels, diversification of gas connections, tourism (particularly winter tourism), and the construction of reservoirs and pumped-storage hydroelectric plants like "Chaira." Dozens of projects have been blocked, causing damages amounting to billions of leva. Most tragically, these actions jeopardize the lives and health of Bulgarian citizens.
