The livestock breeders in the five livestock breeding sites in Velingrad do not recognize the samples from the European reference laboratory in Montpellier, France, which confirmed the positive samples for plague in animals, BNR reported.
This was stated by lawyer Yanichka Metodieva before the temporary commission for establishing the facts about the established outbreaks of plague in small animals:
"The samples in Montpellier we do not know on what date they were sent and which samples were sent. I assume that they will say that they have kept some of the samples. I don't know, I can't guess how far their imagination will go".
The samples were taken from the livestock farmers' farms and sent according to the proper protocol to the European reference laboratory, with the results being positive for plague, the representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture were categorical during the meeting of the temporary committee.
The acting Minister of Agriculture Georgi Tahov emphasized that he had allowed second samples to be taken, which was in violation of the rules, in order to overcome any doubts. The Bulgarian Food Safety Agency again indicated that the first samples were from 65 animals, and the second - from 105, or a total of 170 animals were sampled from the five interconnected livestock farms in Velingrad, and all of them were checked. 70 samples from the two samples were sent to Montpellier. Minister Tahov was categorical:
"There are documents behind every word I say, and the data in these documents are absolutely confirmed and verifiable".
Attorney Metodieva objected to sending samples that have already been worked on in our country, and there are no separate samples to be sent to Montpellier, and admitted that animals may begin to be killed, although, according to her, the animals were healthy.
Minister Tahov assured that there was no procedure for killing the animals:
"Never, because I know that this is being looked into by interested parties, never after the results in Montpellier is it announced that the animals will be destroyed. And we are not announcing anything like that at the moment".