SOFIA (Reuters) - A former Bulgarian security agent escaped unhurt in a grenade attack on his car in Sofia on Thursday, the interior ministry said, a throwback to the gang violence that has dogged the Balkan country since the fall of Communism.

The target, Alexey Petrov, is a former member of the state’s anti-terrorist unit who was arrested and charged in 2010 for running a criminal gang that dealt in money laundering, racketeering, drug trafficking, bribery and tax fraud. Prosecutors later dropped the case for lack of evidence.

“Police officers were dispatched immediately after receiving a signal,” Interior Minister Rumyana Bachvarova said.

“They found that there was shooting with a rocket-propelled grenade,” she said, adding that no one was hurt in the attack.

Petrov, who survived a previous attack in 2002, described the shooting on his car as a mistake.

“Everything I’ve done makes me think I haven’t given anyone a reason to take this action against me,” he told Bulgarian national radio.

Gang violence has waned since the 1990s. But the European Union has repeatedly criticized Bulgaria for a lack of results in the fight against organized crime, failing to jail corrupt officials and overhaul its inefficient judiciary.

“This weapon has been probably taken from the army,” said General Miho Mihov, a former head of the Bulgarian army’s general staff and now a lawmaker. “It is very worrying, we are going back to mobster years.”