Two Bulgarians at Seattle Games May Defect

Two Bulgarian women basketball players, complaining about political repression at home and harsh treatment by their coaches, left the team after the Goodwill Games and are considering seeking asylum.

“All we did was give them the information--what they have to do to file, the requirements and that sort of thing. But we’ve not received an application yet,” Immigration and Naturalization Service spokeswoman Irene Mortensen said.

The two--reserve forwards Lydia Varbanova, 19, and Irena Torolova, 20, both from Sofia--missed their team’s flight to Bulgaria on Monday, and said their coach took their passports with him.

The basketball players bring to at least four the number of Goodwill Games visitors who talked to INS agents and took applications for asylum. The others were a Soviet folk dancer and a Soviet hockey player, Sergei Fedorov, who left the team to sign with the NHL’s Detroit Red Wings.

Asylum is no longer routinely granted to Soviet or Eastern Bloc citizens. They have to prove they face a reasonable fear of persecution in their home country.

The games ended Sunday and Bulgaria beat Brazil for the bronze medal in women’s basketball.

Before the team departed Seattle, Varbanova and Torolova told a reporter they planned to defect.

“June elections in our country were falsified. Conditions are no better than they were before. I don’t foresee any turnaround for our civil and athletic future,” Varbanova said, speaking through an interpreter.

“Some of our friends tried to talk us out of it, but the decision had been reached,” she said.

The women also said they were forced to take drugs they believed to be steroids.