MOSCOW, March 27 - RAPSI. On Tuesday Bulgaria's former Agriculture Minister Miroslav Naidenov was charged with corruption over an EU-backed food distribution scheme and trying to bribe a subordinate, AFP writes citing a statement by the Bulgarian Prosecutor General's Office.

Naidenov was appointed a minister in Boyko Borisov's center-right government in 2009 and was in power until the government was pushed into resignation on February 20 by public protests over growing energy prices.

Prosecutors accuse the 44-year-old of helping a food producer to win a 2010 tender to supply an EU-backed program to distribute food to disadvantaged people.

He has also been charged with promising a bribe of 200,000 levs ($131,700) in 2010 to a senior official at the state agricultural fund which disburses EU aid to farmers, and with pressuring him to sign orders granting a tax refund to two domestic food producers.

If declared guilty, Naidenov, who denies any wrongdoing, may spend up to six years in prison.