About 300 British and Irish investors have said they have lost nearly six millions pounds sterling, or 13.2 million leva, in the Alpine resort of Bansko, in a joint letter sent to Kafeneto.net.

In the letter they explain that they are ordinary people, not businessmen or large scale investors. However, they fear that their investments are likely lost because the future of the enterprise in Bansko now appears uncertain.

A combination of bad circumstances, poor management and rampant corruption, particularly from the British-based and British-run company, Bulgarian Development UK, is to blame, kafeneto.net has said, quoting the letter.

In its defence, the company has argued that the problem lies with alleged corruption in Bulgaria and the global economic downturn.

The letter, however, implicated the UK-based company in financial mismanagement and investing customers' flats as bank guarantees to finance other projects, in spite of the fact that several of those flats were fully paid for, in cash, from the beginning.

Bulgarian Development UK has insisted that they were obliged to adopt such measures in order to pay the MRI construction company in full, and that complications ensued after MRI had terminated construction operations and now the real estate development has stalled altogether, even though it had been paid for by the customers in advance.

It's now likely that the UK-based company will declare bankruptcy, which will spell financial disaster for more than 300 British and Irish investors. The investors themselves have complained and said they were "distraught that neither the Bulgarian nor the European legislature can do anything about the matter, that no one is able to defend their investment and rights".

Consequently, properties which have been fully paid for from the beginning and "should belong to their rightful owners" could be requisitioned and sold on to someone else.

The investors have gone ahead and established their own group, Pirin Park Resort Residential Association, which is entrusted with conducting negotiations aimed at resolving the mess with the construction companies and other parties involved. Furthermore, they have contacted the Bulgarian commissioner in the EU, but this has not yet reaped positive results.