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The European Commission (EC) has placed the lack of control and accountability of the Attorney General at the center of the report on compliance with the rule of law in Bulgaria. Brussels asks the government to solve this problem, as recommended by the Venice Commission of the Council of Europe.
Bulgarians are protesting the lack of sanctions for political corruption and the judiciary is still not fully reformed. There are notable links between politicians and the media, although they are not formalized, the EC wrote, presenting on Wednesday its first comprehensive assessment of the rule of law in each of the 27 EU member states.
The audit examines four main issues: national judicial systems, the fight against corruption, freedom and pluralism of the media, separation and balance between authorities.
The EC conclusions for Bulgaria are a severe blow to the government and the chief prosecutor, whose resignations are demanded for the third month of anti-corruption protests. The head of the state prosecutor’s office, Ivan Geshev, as well as his predecessor, Sotir Tsatsarov, have so far completely denied the problem of their criminal inviolability and their responsibility in society. The European Commission is pushing for real reform that will lead to the creation of truly independent prosecutors capable of investigating the Attorney General.
A slap in the face for the government is the declaration by the European Commission that the country’s main monitoring mechanism has not yet been abolished. “A final decision is pending (on the monitoring introduced in 2007)”writes the EC.
“The lack of results in the fight against corruption is one of the key issues raised by the protests that began in the summer of 2020, and the authorities are still expected to achieve consistent success with final convictions in high-profile corruption cases. “., says the EC.
Wasted chances of abandoning monitoring
The vice president of the EC, Vera Yourova, explained that there was a possibility that the first monitoring would be abandoned, but that decision has not yet been made because there is still work to do.
“It is necessary to finalize the reforms”Yourova insisted and recalled that the trust of Bulgarian society in the judiciary is very low:
“After each study, there has always been a very clear signal from the Bulgarian people that trust in the judiciary and institutions is very low And on the question of whether the EU should continue to push through the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism to advance reforms, the support of the people has always been very strong. At the moment we we continue with the mechanism, making an objective picture of the situation in Bulgaria either for the fight against corruption or for the state of the media. I think the Bulgarian government and parliament must tackle these problems. And they have to take that very seriously because, Since people express so much dissatisfaction and mistrust and the feeling that it is not possible to obtain justice from the State, this is a serious problem, to be assumed by national authorities“.
The EC Vice President pointed out that the follow-up mechanism is one of the tools to continue reforms in Bulgaria..
There is a problem with Geshev and judicial independence
“All prosecutors and investigators are de facto subordinate to the Attorney General”, the European Commission wrote in its report. That tone, devoid of typical EC political correctness, was last seen in the 2013 reports on Bulgaria. At the time, the EC insisted on a “fundamental” reform of the prosecution and the SJC, but dropped that insistence during the Juncker Commission.
The EC argues with the combination of the enormous power of the chief prosecutor in the prosecution and his influence in the Supreme Judicial Council (BCC). He recalled that the Chief Prosecutor was the president and member of the SJC College of Prosecutors. It plays a crucial role in the career development of all prosecutors. The call for Bulgaria is to carry out a reform that will lead to a more balanced SJC. This can be done by reducing the influence of the Attorney General and increasing the number of judicial representatives. The EC recalls that the Chief Prosecutor also has a decisive voice in the election of the two heads of the Supreme Courts.
The overall conclusion is that the overall structure of the SJC creates opportunities to limit judicial independence under pressure from the government, parliament, the attorney general, and the SJC itself.
“RThe demand for the independence of the judges is made clear by the previous attacks on judges in the country and the rhetoric used by public figures (with respect to the court) “says the report.
There is also a problem with judicial inspectionwho is responsible for inspections in the judiciary. The EC recalls that the risk of political interference in inspection activities is significant because inspectors are appointed by parliament. According to the EC, inspectors should be appointed by magistrates. There is concern that judicial inspections could be used to pressure specific judges.
The EC says that if Bulgaria adopts a new constitution, the recommendations of the Council of Europe should be taken into account.. “Bulgaria faces challenges in judicial reform, in particular take steps for the effective accountability and criminal responsibility of the Attorney Generalas recommended by the Venice Commission “, writes in the same introduction to the Bulgarian report.
What happened to Apartmentgate?
The report explicitly mentions the Apartmentgate scandal and the anti-corruption commission’s position that the thugs involved did not have a conflict of interest. Political lobbying in Bulgaria remains unregulated, writes the EC.
In this context, many cases of changes in the laws are remembered through the transitory and final provisions. According to the EC, this could be a sign of unregulated lobbying.
It is recalled that in 2017 and 2018 Bulgaria has reformed the anti-corruption legislative framework, which has led to a better interaction between institutions.
Bulgaria has also been criticized for the state of the mediawho are under political and economic pressure, their property is not transparent enough, and journalists face various threats, including physical or litigation.
The EC also criticizes attempts to pressure on NGOs: “In Bulgaria, a new project to regulate the transparency of foreign NGO funding has drawn criticism for its possible negative impact on civil society.”
What will be the consequences?
EU leaders have yet to make a final decision on whether to relinquish control of Bulgaria and Romania.
In its first joint report, the EC identified risks to the independence of the judiciary, mainly in Hungary and Poland, but there are “challenges” in Bulgaria, Romania, Croatia and Slovakia. Bulgaria, Hungary, Croatia, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Malta are problematic in the fight against corruption. Threats against journalists are particularly worrying in Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Slovenia and Spain, the document says.
The big question now is whether the new EU mechanism to link the rule of law to EU funds will be fully implemented and really have an effect, or whether it will be another useless tool, such as the Cooperation and Evaluation Mechanism.
EP invited to vote on a special resolution for Bulgaria
Bulgaria is threatened by a special European Parliament (EP) resolution on the rule of law, Vice President Iliana Yotova, a former MEP, told BNR on Wednesday. According to her, the separate resolution on Bulgaria is an unprecedented practice.
“I have information that a special resolution for Bulgaria is being prepared. A separate resolution for a country is very rare. European institutions fear interfering in internal processes, especially political ones. To have a special resolution … I don’t want to know what will be written on it.“Yotova said.
The vote on the resolution is scheduled for October 1 in the European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs. The petitioner is Spanish MEP Juan Fernando López Aguilar, a member of the socialist and democratic group.
That the document will probably be critical was also suggested by the words of GERB MEP Emil Radev, depending on when the resolution was written on complaints.
“Unfortunately, the EP does not have the necessary bodies, such as the EC, which prepares this objective evaluation report in dialogue with both the public authorities and the NGO sector, has reliable information and verifies all complaints and facts. On the contrary, and regrettably, I can say that the resolution in the EP is drafted mainly on the basis of complaints that have flooded my colleagues in the European Parliament on a daily basis for the last 3 months. Unfortunately, the resolution is now becoming purely political, because we see that the political families in Bulgaria have transferred the battle to the political families in Europe. We see extreme left socialists and greens on the one hand and the EPP and conservatives on the other“Radev said.
What did the Bulgarian Minister of Justice say?
In response to the EC’s criticism of the lack of accountability and inaccessibility of the chief prosecutor, Justice Minister Desislava Akhladova pointed to the frozen bill introduced last year by her predecessor, Danail Kirilov.
Kirilov’s project required the appointment of an independent prosecutor with the power to investigate the boss. The problems with this project a year and a half ago were the following: the independent prosecutor was appointed by the fiscal board, dominated by the attorney general, and would continue to work within the prosecution, that is. functionally subordinate to the boss. The project also does not solve the problem of institutional support that this independent prosecutor could count on.
“It is currently being debated whether this independent prosecutor, who will investigate the attorney general, has full independence and whether he would not be subordinate to the attorney general in any way.”Ahladova said as he read the position on a sheet.
The full press conference of the European Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders and the Vice-President of the European Commission Vera Yourova can be seen HERE
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