(SOFIA) - Bulgaria's Socialist-led government vowed Tuesday to step up its fight against organised crime after two daytime killings this week in Sofia prompted calls for action from Brussels.

"The government will continue its firm and result-oriented policy in the fight against organised crime," its information service said in a statement.

It added that it would "undertake radical structural measures to reform the interior ministry," recently shaken by a huge corruption scandal, using "all the potential and resources of state institutions to counter corruption and organised crime".

The statement followed calls by the European Commission Tuesday for "urgent action" against organised crime, after two high-profile figures were shot execution-style in Sofia Sunday and Monday.

The killings drew calls from the right-wing opposition in parliament for the government to resign over its failure to halt mafia shootings.

Georgy Stoev, known as the chronicler of the underworld for nine books on the origins of the Bulgarian mafia, was killed Monday outside a downtown Sofia hotel with a single gunshot to the head.

Stoev claimed to have known some of the country's biggest gangland bosses well and used their real names in his books.

In his last appearance on bTV television on March 29, he requested protection to testify against the mafia and said there was "beyond all doubt" a high-level political umbrella over the underworld, adding that the interior minister was also implicated.

Late Sunday, Borislav Georgiev, the chief executive of a large energy company, was killed in his apartment building with two bullets to the head.

The shootings came amid an interior ministry scandal that exposed links between top crime-busters and criminals under investigation.

Interior Minister Rumen Petkov, who admitted to having contacts with key organised crime suspects, has refused to resign. The coalition was to discuss his fate Wednesday.

The government also faces a no-confidence vote in parliament this week over "the collusion between organised crime and the interior ministry's leadership," the opposition said.

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