Petar Stoyanov

Petar Stefanov Stoyanov (born May 25, 1952) was the president of Bulgaria from 1997 until 2002. He won the 1996 presidential election as a candidate of the Union of Democratic Forces. He received more votes than the socialist candidate Ivan Marazev and the Bulgarian Business Block candidate, George Ganchev in the first round. He then defeated Marazev in a runoff. In the 2001 presidential election he received second place, as Georgi Purvanov received 36.3%, Stoyanov received 34.9% and the third major candidate, Bogomil Bonev received 19.2%. Stoyanov lost the runoff with Purvanov 53.3%-46.7%.