Clive Palmer and his fugitive nephew Clive Mensink make next move in Bulgaria

Clive Palmer has made a new move overseas and the mining mogul’s fugitive nephew Clive Mensink appears to show no sign of returning to Australia.

Exclusive: Clive Palmer and his family have strengthened their foothold in Bulgaria, with the mining mogul registering a business in the capital Sofia and his fugitive nephew Clive Mensink buying an apartment and showing no sign of returning to Australia.

As Mr Palmer seeks to re-boot his political career with a run for the Senate, a News Corp investigation has revealed Mr Palmer has registered a Bulgarian business at the same address as that of a lawyer who has twice accompanied Mr Mensink as he crossed the border into North Macedonia.

The business, Palmer Investment EOOD, shares an address with the office of Sofia lawyer Hyristian Lakov.

Mr Lakov was with Mr Mensink when he fled Bulgaria for five weeks in 2018, using a backwater border crossing at Gyueshevo to get in to North Macedonia.

Three warrants are outstanding for the arrest of Mr Mensink, who went on what was described as a holiday in June 2016, two months after the Palmer-owned Queensland Nickel refinery in Townsville went broke, owing $30 million to employees and almost $200 million to other creditors.

Mining Billionaire Clive Palmer, on his superyacht 'Australia' in Sydney ahead of his defamation court case against WA Premier Mark McGowan. Picture: Jane Dempster/The Australian.

Mr Mensink, who was the sole director of Queensland Nickel at the time, is the subject of two warrants from the Federal Court, and one that has been issued by the corporate regulator ASIC. Mr Mensink has launched court proceedings to have the Federal Court warrants dismissed, given that the battle with liquidators has finished and the debts resolved.

A Federal Court hearing in 2017 was told Mr Palmer continued to pay his nephew $4000 a week while he was in Bulgaria. It is not known if those payments are continuing. Mr Palmer’s spokesman did not respond to questions about his or Mr Mensink’s activities in Bulgaria.

Investigations show Mr Mensink seems to be settled in Bulgaria, which does not have an extradition treaty with Australia.

He has purchased a fifth-floor apartment on Vassil Levski Boulevard, close to the centre of Sofia. He settled the deal to buy the flat from a company named Darrikom on February 7, 2019, property records show.

Clive Mensink, the nephew of Clive Palmer in Sofia, Bulgaria. Picture: Ella Pellegrini

In February 2018, News Corp sprung Mr Mensink living the high life with his glamorous girlfriend Gabriela Konstantinova in an up-market suburb of Sofia close to the Hilton Hotel.

As well as the warrants, which relate to his failure to appear in person to answer liquidators’ questions, Mr Mensink remains subject to an Interpol Blue Notice, a reporting mechanism which is triggered when he crosses international borders.

Vassil Levski Boulevard in Sofia, Bulgaria. Picture: Supplied

Mr Palmer’s wife Anna is Bulgarian-born, and records show the billionaire Queensland businessman has flown in and out of the Eastern European country on a regular basis in recent years, until Covid-19 closed the borders.

It is not clear what, if anything, his business in Sofia does, as it has not filed any financial returns.

On one of his trips in 2018, Mr Palmer was accompanied by a Dutch citizen named Bart Jan Hermans.

Gabriela Konstantinova, the Bulgarian girlfriend of Clive Mensink, Clive Palmer's nephew who is on the run. Picture: Facebook

Mr Palmer and Mr Mensink have family connections in the Netherlands, and Mr Palmer has arrived into Bulgaria on a private jet chartered from Dutch company Exxaero.

Mr Palmer was also accompanied by a woman named Anna Maria Janssen, and two women who appear to be corporate jet flight attendants.

In 2019, the Palmers flew into Sofia aboard their private jet, registered in the tax haven of the Cayman Islands. A Hawker 4000 previously known as VH-CPP, it has since been deregistered.

They were accompanied by an American citizen named as Thomas Campbell Howard, and the Palmer’s personal jet pilot, Carlo Filingeri.

The private jet Clive Palmer used. Picture: Supplied

Mr Filingeri, who once stood as a Palmer candidate in the Gold Coast seat of Burleigh but did not campaign, hit the headlines in 2020 when it was revealed he had filled out three exemption applications for Mr Palmer to be allowed into Western Australia.

On one of the applications, Mr Filingeri listed himself as female, and Mr Palmer as his husband, and in the second, he listed Mr Palmer’s wife Anna as his own wife.

WA’s refusal to allow him in to the state sparked Mr Palmer’s High Court battle with WA Premier Mark McGowan.

WA Attorney-General John Quigley said: “I understand that these applications were not approved because everyone thought it was a hoax, with Mr Palmer being nominated as the ‘husband’ of his pilot.’’

Clive Palmer’s wife Anna Palmer. Picture: AAP

Mr Palmer was narrowly elected to the House of Representatives for a single term in 2013 under the banner of the Palmer United Party. He has since rebadged his party as the United Australia Party and is spending millions of dollars campaigning for a seat in the Senate, and for candidates in various seats across Australia, including Liberal defector Craig Kelly.

In March 2020, Mr Palmer was charged with two counts each of fraud and dishonest use of his position as a director of his company Mineralogy.

ASIC alleged that between August and September 2013, Mr Palmer authorised the transfer of $12 million, contrary to the purpose for which the funds were being held, to provide an advantage to the Palmer United Party and/or two other companies.

He denies all charges. The matter, and a resulting legal battle, in which the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions and ASIC are challenging Mr Palmer’s bid to have the prosecution called off, continues.