• While the prospect of Bulgaria’s regular elections to the National Assembly on April 4 restrained governance in the first quarter of 2021, the failure to forge governing majorities after these elections and a second set of elections on July 11 further constrained political decision-making until the double (snap parliamentary and presidential) votes on November 14 (with a presidential runoff on November 21).
• After the first and second parliamentary elections, the parliament was split into two wings. The “old” parties (Prime Minister Boyko Borisov’s GERB, the Bulgarian Socialist Party [BSP], and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms [DPS]) were dubbed “status quo” players by newcomers who had not served in the outgoing 2017–21 parliament and thus styled themselves as “change parties.” Prominent within this evolving political scene was former talk show host Slavi Trifonov and his party There Is Such a People (ITN), one of three rising forces emerging from the turmoil of the 2020 anticorruption protests. The other two were Democratic Bulgaria, a coalition speaking up for mostly urban, educated voters on an anticorruption platform, and a small alliance dubbed Stand Up! Thugs Out! (formed by organizers of the protests and former ombudsman Maya Manolova, who organized her own demonstrations).
• These “new/change” parties urged a break with Borisov’s governance, which they blamed for endemic corruption and the country’s failure to catch up to Western European economies. The “new” parties were wary of forming a majority with the “old/status quo” parties yet nevertheless lacked a sufficient number of MPs on their own to govern either in April or July (when they commanded only 92 and 112 seats, respectively, out of the total 240 seats in the unicameral National Assembly).
• As a result, two parliaments in a row failed to form a government. In April, PM Borisov made controversial offers (such as “lending” lawmakers or artificially lowering the quorum for approving a government by having MPs walk out) to Trifonov,10 while the latter was opposed to an “unprincipled coalition” with the “old parties” after the first elections, when his ITN party came in second.11 In July, when ITN came in first, Trifonov unilaterally proposed a “non-negotiable” cabinet lineup (Trifonov was not PM-designate), asking potential allies (the “new parties” and, this time, the establishment BSP) for their support yet offering nothing in return, thus alienating these potential partners. The talks were ultimately torpedoed by a plagiarism scandal surrounding Trifonov’s pick for interior minister.12
• President Rumen Radev affirmed his image as an archrival of Borisov, emerging as an essential political player with the constitutionally mandated task of appointing two consecutive caretaker governments. In May, he appointed his defense and security adviser Stefan Yanev, former defense attaché to the United States, as prime minister. Many of Radev’s cabinet appointments were at odds with Borisov and GERB—for instance, naming former National Investigative Office head Boyko Rashkov, who vowed to expose wrongdoing by Borisov’s administration and Chief Prosecutor Ivan Geshev’s office, as interior minister.13
• Long-standing tensions between Radev and Geshev continued to simmer in 2021. Urged on by Radev, caretaker Justice Minister Yanaki Stoilov unsuccessfully sought Geshev’s resignation (see “Judicial Framework and Independence”). Later, Prime Minister Kiril Petkov’s new government also showed its determination to remove Geshev. On December 14, newly inaugurated Justice Minister Nadezhda Yordanova said that coalition partners planned to conclude the process by the end of 2022 once new Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) members had been elected (the SJC oversees judicial authorities and is in charge of picking the next Chief Prosecutor).14
• Two short-lived parliaments became de-facto campaign battlegrounds for political parties. MPs gave up their traditional summer recess, while “new parties” used the time to propose the establishment of parliamentary committees looking into Borisov’s governance; one scrutinized all the activities of Borisov's cabinets over the past years, another inquiring a mass surveillance scandal related to last year's protests, and a third looking into the Rosenets affair, an incident that helped trigger the protests15 . However, successful legislative activity was limited to a few acts including the national budget and budgets of public health and insurance funds. Soon after its appointment, the interim cabinet also ordered a review of numerous agencies, from finance to culture. Allegations of irregularities appeared in the ensuing reports (see “Corruption”). Many officials were removed: from regional police chiefs (replaced in order to crack down on vote-buying and voter intimidation) to heads of border police, companies managing public forestry assets and the management of EU agriculture subsidies allocation fund (known for numerous cases of mismanagement under some past governments), and all regional governors (appointed officials representing the government regionally), were replaced, alongside the revenue agency head.16 The security sector was most affected. In May, the directors of counter-intelligence (DAR), foreign intelligence (DANS,) and special surveillance agencies (DATO) simultaneously requested leaves of absence17 as the government took over. Authorities alleged that the officials were deliberately avoiding being on duty at that time. Subsequently, DAR head Dimitar Georgiev (who clashed with Interior Minister Rashkov over a move to bar the minister from accessing classified information) and DANS head Atanas Atanasov were dismissed over allegedly politicizing the security sector. Atanasov was also accused18 of not sharing information with the government. The DATO director and the head of military intelligence were the next to be dismissed.19 The head of the Interior Ministry’s anti-organized crime directorate20 was also replaced.21 The caretaker government claimed it was cleaning house after years of corrupt rule by GERB, while the departing officials argued their ousters were politically motivated.
• Some caretaker government appointments stirred controversy, including revenue agency head Rumen Spetsov (over alleged financial irregularities)22 and Rashkov’s political cabinet chief Elena Ficherova (who participated in fugitive businessman Vasil Bozhkov’s Bulgaria Summer political platform and subsequently resigned23 ).24
• The caretaker government’s activities and pledge to boost democracy pushed up its approval rating. Caretaker Economy and Finance Ministers Kiril Petkov and Asen Vasilev decided to wade into politics. The duo’s campaign to crack down on corruption and irregularities and their emphasis on tax collection helped it earn the trust of voters. Opting out of the second caretaker government, they launched the electoral project We Continue the Change, seeking a “coalition of at least 121 honest lawmakers” among all parties that could form the next majority and use “right-of-center instruments” to achieve “left-of-center policies”25 among all political forces in the parliament. In the run-up to the November elections, some polls put them in second place (at 15 percent)26 after GERB.27 However, Petkov was under fire over whether he illegally held a Canadian passport while serving as caretaker economy minister. The issue was solved by the Constitutional Court, which revoked the decree that had made him economy minister, ruling he had been wrongly appointed since he was a dual national at the time in contravention of the constitution.28 Ultimately, this could make his tenure and a set of government decisions void if they are contested before the court.29 Petkov and Vasilev’s We Continue the Change nevertheless won the November 14 elections, bringing them to the helm of a new government.
• Following the November elections, the leaders of both the Bulgarian Socialist Party and Democratic Bulgaria resigned since their support had dropped considerably, with hundreds of thousands of votes lost to Petkov and Vasilev’s project.30 Their success brought new and young politicians into the parliament and the government,31 but the benefits of fresh faces without experience were quickly called into question. The cabinet’s honeymoon ended just after its swearing-in as political inexperience pushed new MPs into a trap, with lawmakers from the governing majority inexplicably backing the (center-right) opposition’s proposal to freeze power prices indefinitely just as the government was debating new price controls.32

• The year’s initial parliamentary elections on April 4 saw PM Borisov’s GERB retain first place followed by Slavi Trifonov’s There Is Such A People (ITN) party, which one less than a quarter of the vote. But their positions reversed in the second elections, when ITN rose to the top as voters utterly rejected the existing political elite (although ITN saw its support fade over the summer). For the first time in years, the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP), until then the biggest parliamentary opposition force against GERB, slumped to third place in both parliamentary votes.33 The Democratic Bulgaria coalition entered the parliament, unlike in 2017 when its members ran independently. The nationalist Patriotic Front coalition, junior partner in Borisov’s last government, ran as separate parties yet failed to pass the 4-percent threshold in April but also in July despite rejoining hands.
• In April, voting on either paper or machines was available to the public in polling stations with more than 300 voters (nearly 80 percent). In the town Veliko Tarnovo, technical problems brought machine voting to a halt, while machines at several stations in the capital Sofia and elsewhere stopped working altogether.34 Hundreds of alerts, mostly for technical problems but also vote buying, were sent to a civic platform, while others were submitted to the Prosecutor’s Office, which later announced it had launched dozens of probes during the campaign.35 The Organization for Security Co-operation in Europe’s Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (OSCE/ODIHR) reported that Bulgarian stakeholders had concerns over the complicated mixed system of paper and machine voting and possible vote buying. ODIHR noted the recent lifting of the ceiling for campaign donations and reintroduction of donations for legal entities.36 While ODIHR described the April voting itself as “transparent,” it also cited interlocutors who had discussed attempts at widespread vote buying and controlled voting in some communities. ODIHR also reported that preelection government spending had given an edge to the main governing party37 and that state resources were used, merging state and party during the campaign.38
• In the July parliamentary elections, machine voting in stations with more than 300 voters was mandatory, as the parliament had amended the electoral code at the end of April.39 The decision to make machine voting compulsory in all polling stations with more than 300 voters was controversial with both GERB and experts who feared this would keep older voters away from the polls.40 The move came before the new early vote was called and required the swift delivery of more machines amidst a dispute with the contracted provider. However, machines were ultimately delivered, with problems registered on July 11 only with 52 out of 10,516 machines (0.49 percent).41
• The July elections were better run than the previous vote, although ODIHR noted that cooperation was lacking between the Prosecutor’s Office and the Interior Ministry, and that many cases of alleged fraud were not investigated.42 At the same time, ODIHR singled out “law-enforcement’s actions to curb vote buying,” giving credit to caretaker Interior Minister Rashkov’s claims of having reined in vote buying to a certain extent.43 A similar analysis came from the nongovernmental Anti-Corruption Fund, whose report on the July elections suggested turnout had decreased much more sharply in at-risk regions than elsewhere.44
• In both April and July, businesspersons investigated or tried by authorities decided to run in a bid for immunity from prosecution, including Vasil Bozhkov and Minyu Staykov, who is charged with tax fraud, money laundering, and abuse of EU funds.45 Neither made it into the parliament (despite multiple attempts), but both briefly enjoyed immunity as candidates.
• The unprecedented third parliamentary elections in November saw ex-caretaker ministers Petkov and Vasilev’s We Continue the Change project come in first place, and the duo identified ITN and BSP as potential coalition partners after the vote. At the same time, the parliament became even more fragmented with 7 parties crossing the 4-percent threshold, including the far-right Vazrazhdane (Revival), which had capitalized on the rejection of COVID-19 measures and COVID-19 certificates, the latter introduced in October.46 The November elections campaign was marked by polarization over the handling of the pandemic, with smaller parties largely seeking to ride a wave of COVID-19 and vaccine skepticism among the population, with 70 percent disbelieving the existence of COVID-19, according to a Kantar Bulgaria poll.47
• Simultaneous with the November parliamentary vote, the presidential elections resulted in incumbent Rumen Radev being reelected in a runoff on November 21. While Radev was only backed by the BSP in 2016, most of the parties opposed to GERB backed him in the latest vote. One exception was Democratic Bulgaria, which raised its own candidate. The Movement for Rights and Freedoms (DPS) raised Mustafa Karadayi, Bulgaria’s first ethnic Turk presidential candidate, who came in third. Other candidates—including Radev’s leading contender, Sofia University rector Anastas Gerdzhikov—were proposed by so-called citizen initiative committees but were endorsed by political parties: GERB in the case of Gerdzhikov, and Democratic Bulgaria in the case of Supreme Cassation Court head Lozan Panov.48
• Days before the presidential runoff, Interior Minister Rashkov announced that a campaign favoring the DPS candidate Karadayi had been launched in Turkish media49 and backed by officials and politicians in Turkey, accusing Ankara of interference. Turkey’s ambassador was summoned by the Foreign Ministry,50 while Turkey summoned the Bulgarian envoy to present a diplomatic note of protest against the accusations.51 While Karadayi had the third-best result on November 14, the DPS managed to triple its results in the parliamentary elections, securing 90,000 votes from voters in Turkey52 (against 30,000 in July), its best showing since 2013. The presidential runoff on November 21, in which Karadayi did not run, saw fewer votes from Turkey than in July.53
• In the first week of November, GERB alleged that additional machines stored at a warehouse would be used to rig the election, a ploy the Central Election Commission (CEC) suspected was an attempt to discredit machine voting.54 In response, the CEC changed the rules just two days before the election to count all machine receipts after the vote instead of just those in 30 percent of polling stations as previously stipulated. This parallel count would not influence the election results but was seen as controversial by some politicians and experts who questioned the need to do a parallel hand count after having adopted machine voting.55
• Media reports suggested that vote buying had also occurred in snap local elections in several municipalities in June and October, but there was no follow-up from authorities.56

• In February, the unsanctioned Lukovmarsh rally, a torch-lit procession organized by far-right forces, was foiled by police. A few days later, the Sofia City Court rejected the prosecution’s demand to ban Bulgarian National Union–Edelweiss, the rally organizers. While Lukovmarsh has been criticized for instilling hatred and anti-Semitism, the court argued that the organizers are not fully equivalent to their predecessor groups, who were accused of anti-Semitic activity. Had the court handed down a ban, it would have been the first for a civic organization since democratic independence in 1989.57
• The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) ruled in February that Bulgarian courts had tolerated the hate speech of far-right leader and former lawmaker Volen Siderov that targeted Roma and Jewish people when it had turned down requests filed by plaintiffs between 2009 and 2012.58
• In its report on the July 11 elections, OSCE/ODIHR noted that most political parties and coalitions had not included policies for Roma integration in their electoral platforms. Several ODIHR interlocutors stated that Roma voters are still subject to intimidation and attempted vote buying. Others stated that campaign activities among Roma communities were rare.59
• In October, an LGBT+ organization reported that a group led by far-right presidential candidate Boyan Rasate had broken into its office, wrecking the premises and assaulting a worker. Rasate was initially arrested but later freed on bail to facilitate the investigation. The incident drew widespread condemnation from Western officials and the Council of Europe.60
• During the year, the civic sector was largely focused on inquiries into the 2020 anticorruption protests, police violence, and wiretapping of citizens. In May, the electoral alliance Democratic Bulgaria alleged that the Interior Ministry had eavesdropped on 32 opposition politicians before the April 4 elections, while PM Borisov’s government was still in charge. It argued that the wiretapping activities were a continuation of surveillance of hundreds of activists and politicians from the 2020 protests (with the prosecution citing subversion provisions in the criminal code as authorization). Caretaker Interior Minister Rashkov confirmed the allegations, and a short-lived parliamentary committee subsequently issued a report with recommendations to both the Interior Ministry and the prosecution.61 Next, the prosecution launched and then closed a probe, citing lack of evidence.62 Its only active inquiry remained an investigation into four police officers charged in August with inflicting minor bodily harm on protesters.63 In July, Rashkov said the government had also been surveilling hundreds of protesters (including a “politically active citizen” for about nine months) and ignoring statutory limits for periods of surveillance.64

• In January, Kiril Valchev was appointed director of the state-owned Bulgarian News Agency. Formerly a journalist for a popular radio outlet, Valchev pledged to establish free access to much of the locally produced news if the agency could secure a larger budget for the following year.65 His proposal was submitted to and approved by the parliament.66
• In March, months after the Netherlands-based United Group acquired Nova TV, one of Bulgaria’s two largest outlets, it also finalized a deal to buy all newspapers owned by former MP Delyan Peevski since he was withdrawing from the media industry. This virtually created Bulgaria’s largest-ever media conglomerate.67 While these changes ended the dependency of a major TV station and some print media on Peevski, who was subsequently placed under US Global Magnitsky Act sanctions (see “Corruption”), they have yet to deliver a marked qualitative change in their journalistic content.
• In March, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) voiced concern over political interests “buying” positive media coverage. Besides calling for an end to this practice, RSF published additional recommendations68 to Bulgarian media, including increasing security for journalists and protection from strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs), improving access to information, and strengthening the independence of public media, among others. In July, the EU echoed these concerns, noting in particular that Bulgaria lacks legislation barring politicians from owning media outlets.69
• Around the April 4 elections, OSCE/ODIHR described Bulgarian media ownership as “highly concentrated” and “subject to political influence, negatively impacting editorial diversity.” It also pointed to self-censorship fueled by pressure on investigative journalists and the lack of full investigations of attacks against journalists. It noted that the public broadcaster Bulgarian National Television had “mostly refrained” from coverage of contenders in the elections, favoring government officials, alongside flawed editorial coverage that lacked investigations and analytical reporting, thus hampering voters’ ability “to make an informed choice.”70
• In April, TV Evropa, run by a CEO close to GERB,71 signed a deal to become Euronews Bulgaria. The channel, which had yet to begin broadcasting by year’s end, would be managed by an editor who had worked at Nova TV72 when the latter was owned by businessman Kiril Domuschiev, also considered close to GERB.73 These factors raised concerns over whether the outlet would continue its partisan affiliation under the trusted Euronews brand.74
• The caretaker government overstepped its boundaries in dealing with the media in at least one instance. In May, Interior Minister Rashkov said on public radio that he would fire the anchors of bTV’s morning program after they asked him questions about his chief of staff’s links to businessman Vasil Bozhkov; Rashkov subsequently apologized.75 In November, Health Minister Stoycho Katsarov asked bTV hosts whether a demonstration waiting for him outside the station was organized by the outlet.76
• In August, the Interior Ministry admitted there had been police violence against freelance journalist Dimiter Kenarov,77 who was severely beaten in September 2020, despite having claimed the contrary in December; nevertheless, the Prosecutor’s Office declined to investigate.78 In April, the caretaker culture minister, sculptor Velislav Minekov, revealed that authorities had bugged German journalists, among many others.79
• In August, Andon Baltakov resigned as director of the Bulgarian National Radio after 19 months80 in office. It was his second resignation yet, unlike the first, was accepted by the Council for Electronic Media (CEM), the government watchdog. Baltakov initially cited personal reasons but later said he had felt threatened (including physically, when he saw that someone had broken into his apartment without stealing anything) and that obstructions were being created to performing the duties of his job. He also mentioned a lack of support from Bulgaria’s journalistic community.81 He spoke of a “toxic environment” and an inescapable governmental “grip on power.”82 These claims were never formally investigated. In October, Milen Mitev, a former legal adviser to the public radio and hired as its interim director-general after Baltakov’s resignation, was appointed on a permanent basis by the CEM following a competition.83

• COVID-19 vaccination rules were a source of controversy at the local level as early as January, when municipal councilors used their positions of power to receive an early shot (even before medical staff) despite not being eligible at that time. Neither central nor local authorities were swift to react with an update to the rules.84
• In February, then-ruling GERB won mayoral posts in three municipalities and lost three seats in partial municipal council elections.85 In June, snap elections were held in the city of Blagoevgrad, where former mayor Rumen Tomov had been removed in 2020 (and a higher-instance court upheld the ruling in April86 ) due to conflicts-of-interest since Tomov had failed to sell a company at the beginning of his term. A candidate nominated by Trifonov’s ITN won in this case. Snap local elections were simultaneously held in seven small municipalities and won by candidates of various parties.87 Another set of snap elections were held in six other municipalities in October.88
• Similar to 2020, crises regarding the environment or local resources abounded in different municipalities and regions. Problems with sewage in the Varna municipality resulted in a constant blame game between the central government, the municipality, and utility companies and their local officials as tons of sewage polluted Lake Varna.89 The media exposed concerns over poorly maintained infrastructure and schemes involving the possible abuse of EU money earmarked for the laying of sewer pipe on the lakebed. A similar recurring problem appeared in Sinemorets, in southeastern Bulgaria, linked to ill-regulated construction.90
• Varna municipality was also involved in funding local media to the tune of 300,000 BGN under vague criteria, two weeks ahead of the national elections in April.91 A month earlier, other municipalities in various parts of Bulgaria saw the allocation of 30 million BGN, either for disaster prevention or, according to PM Borisov, “directly for the people” and the maintenance of schools, parks, and sports activities, among others. This is a typical practice ahead of elections and criticized by international organizations.
• In October, the caretaker government began working on a decentralization plan for municipal budgets. The goal is to submit a proposal to the next parliament that would allow increased budget autonomy for local needs in education, commerce, and so forth. Municipalities have maintained for years that the current centralized model hampers their ability to solve local issues and crises.92 The topic has divided politicians for decades, with some arguing that it would be detrimental to smaller, less-developed regions while kickstarting growth in more advanced ones.93
• The former Sofia police chief, Ivaylo Ivanov, who was fired by caretaker Interior Minister Rashkov over allegations of police violence, was appointed by Sofia Mayor Yordanka Fandakova to head the capital’s municipality inspectorate in October, despite escalating political fallout from the 2020 anticorruption protests.94 Fandakova initially defended her choice, but a month later, she dissolved the inspectorate95 and announced that a selection process would determine Ivanov’s successor, with Ivanov yet to clarify whether he would run for the position.96 In mid-December, Fandakova again reversed course and decided against closing down the inspectorate.97 The incident highlighted the partisan use of local government power to reward loyalists.

• In January, the parliament voted to empower a prosecutor to investigate the Chief Prosecutor, a position long criticized by the EU and local actors for being effectively unaccountable.98 In February, President Radev vetoed the law, saying it jeopardized the Chief Prosecutor’s independence (the law equated the investigating prosecutor to the chief prosecutor).99 The project was short-lived since the Constitutional Court, upon the president’s referral, declared the establishment of such a position unconstitutional in May.100
• The ECtHR issued multiple rulings against Bulgaria during the year. In February, three plaintiffs who were subjected to sexual violence in a Bulgarian orphanage in 2002–03 won their case.101 Another case was won by businessman Minyu Staykov, who had been subjected to prolonged detention without a court verdict, but his request for compensation was turned down. Staykov had been arrested in 2018 for cigarette smuggling and tax crimes and held for eight months (the statutory limit) but was not released afterwards, instead facing new counts of criminal association.102
• The year saw ongoing clashes between the Prosecutor’s Office and the caretaker government and the presidency (both institutions accusing the prosecution of politicization). In June, caretaker Interior Minister Rashkov announced that Chief Prosecutor Ivan Geshev’s office had summoned security and intelligence officials for questioning; this move allegedly related to the ongoing wiretapping affair (see “Civil Society”).103 Rashkov also alleged that the directorates in his ministry in charge of wiretapping had acted at the behest of the Specialized Prosecutor’s office in violation of Bulgarians laws on classified information, something the latter denied. In August, the parliament voted unanimously to demand that Geshev submit a report on the prosecution’s activities with regard to police violence against 2020 anticorruption protesters.104
• The European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) began work in July, but it rejected 6 out of 10 candidates delegated by Bulgaria because, formally, they were investigators or judges rather than prosecutors. Bulgaria had the highest rejection rate in the EU. Media reports also suggested some of the proposed names had little or no experience.105 In October, the nominations of four more prosecutors from Bulgaria were approved by the EPPO. The two remaining candidates have not yet been turned down, but their rejection would trigger a third selection procedure.106 In December, European Chief Prosecutor Laura Kövesi said she had asked Bulgarian institutions for more information about the two remaining candidates, a procedure used when issues are found in nominees’ CVs or cover letters.107 (In early 2022, one of the two was approved, while the other was rejected.108 )
• In July, caretaker Justice Minister Yanaki Stoilov proposed to the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) that Geshev be removed from office, citing “action and inaction” tarnishing the judiciary’s prestige. However, the SJC declined to consider the request.109
• Also in July, the EU’s rule-of-law report noted that Bulgaria’s Chief Prosecutor wielded an extraordinary number of competences and remains beyond scrutiny, and that the judicial appointment system was flawed. Concerns were raised over the absence of a national protocol that would oversee judicial reform once the EU’s Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM) is revoked. (The CVM is a report monitoring Bulgaria and Romania’s judiciary since their entry into the EU to improve deficiencies in rule of law and fighting corruption.)110
• The SJC, the judiciary’s top decision-making body, decided in August against disciplining Andon Mitalov, a judge sanctioned by the United States in 2020 for corruption.111 Back in July 2020, then-Justice Minister Danail Kirilov had demanded the judge’s resignation when Mitalov allowed a politician charged with espionage to travel to Russia to receive a state decoration. Yet, a year after the sanctions were enacted, magistrates have still not received evidence of significant corruption despite suspicion that Mitalov was involved in the so-called Eight Dwarves case (see “Corruption”).112
• In September, the parliament voted to relocate the Prosecution’s Witnesses Protection Bureau to the Justice Ministry, also stripping this entity of the right to participate in prosecutorial operations. Backers of the initiative argued that the prosecution had used the bureau as a militarized unit taking part in its special operations targeting Geshev’s enemies.113 In 2020, bureau agents took part in controversial detentions, including that of President Radev’s secretary, Plamen Uzunov (which in February 2021 was declared illegal114 ), and had guarded Geshev alongside the National Protection Office and the Interior Ministry.

• In February, the EU’s anti-fraud agency, OLAF, announced that Bulgaria must return €6 million since it had violated terms of the funds’ allocation by buying older, and not necessarily suitable, SUVs (made by the Bulgaria-based company Great Wall) rather than new police cars for difficult terrain.115 OLAF recommended that the Specialized Prosecution decide whether to launch an investigation, but the latter attached the alert to another unspecified case. The Interior Ministry’s administrative secretary, Boyko Slavchev, a witness in the investigation, was the first person at the ministry dismissed by caretaker minister Rashkov.116
• OLAF announced in July that it was investigating 29 cases of possible abuse of EU funding and corruption in Bulgaria.117 OLAF was also considering whether to conduct a fact-finding mission in the country to learn why EU projects always went to the same companies.
• In both short-lived parliaments, the “change parties” established “revision committees” aimed at exposing wrongdoing and corruption cases from the Borisov government. The first case, in May, featured a highly publicized scandal with corruption and cartel allegations in the agricultural sector. Svetoslav Ilchovski, an agriculture manufacturer, alleged that associates around Borisov had used institutions (the Agriculture Ministry and its respective agencies, in particular)118 to dictate prices, shape markets, and use the prosecution against certain individuals. In September, the Interior Ministry said the EPPO would look into Ilchovski’s claims.119 More prominently, the first caretaker government reviewed alleged irregularities at agencies and institutions, including, notably, the state-owned Bulgarian Development Bank (BDB) where credits to the tune of 1 billion BGN were reportedly handed out to eight companies, half of which were indirectly linked to former MP Delyan Peevski.120 After those announcements in May, then-Economy Minister Kiril Petkov replaced the BDB’s management, with whom he had displayed tense relations.121 Petkov also examined projects at other state-owned companies, including faulty repairs at hundreds of dams at inflated prices with a total budget of over half a billion BGN, as well as illegal road repairs.122 Finance Minister Asen Vasilev argued that companies with high cash stockpiles should be inspected for corruption, such as the Russian company Lukoil. No probes were launched by state prosecutors in these cases despite ministers’ assurance that data on all irregularities had been submitted to the prosecution.
• In June, the US-sanctioned businessman Vasil Bozhkov (who fled to Dubai in 2020), ex-lawmaker Delyan Peevski, and the head of the National Bureau for Control on Special Intelligence-Gathering Devices, Ilko Zhelyazkov, were designated under the Global Magnitsky Act, while Peevski and Zhelyazkov were also sanctioned under Section 7031(c) for involvement in significant corruption, barring them from entering the US and cutting their access to the US financial system.123 The US pointed to Bozhkov’s past and planned acts of bribery (including intentions to help create a channel for Russian political leaders).124 Regarding Peevski, the US claimed he had used Zhelyazkov as a “front man” to engage in corruption, including for bribes and running a scheme for Bulgarian residency documents. In addition, three other GERB-era officials were sanctioned under Section 7031(c) for significant corruption and undermining the rule of law.125 Section 7031(c) was used earlier against the US-designated judge Andon Mitalov.126 Bulgarian authorities were swift to act following the US sanctions. The Bulgarian National Bank blocked all accounts of the three. The Finance Ministry drew up a blacklist adding 34 companies run or owned by Bozhkov and Peevski over the past five years, adding those to the 64 designated by the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).127 Peevski, whose name meanwhile appeared in the massive Pandora Papers leak,128 appealed his blacklisting at the Supreme Administrative Court. The Prosecutor’s Office insisted that it had conducted 14 probes into Peevski’s dealings yet found no irregularities.129 Zhelyazkov was formally dismissed by lawmakers in July after resigning a month earlier.130
• Despite rampant corruption allegations, there was no major sentencing of a former high-profile political figure for corruption during the year. In July, an appellate court upheld the guilty verdict of former economy and energy minister Rumen Ovcharov (BSP) for willful neglect, handing him a two-year suspended sentence and barring him from public office for three years.131 The Specialized Prosecution, which deals with cases involving corruption and organized crime, confirmed in July that there were no sentences for high-level corruption in 2020 out of the 274 corruption cases it oversaw.132 Separately, in July, the Specialized Prosecutor’s Office confirmed it had ended a probe into administrative abuse and influence peddling against former finance minister (under Borisov) Vladislav Goranov in 2019 without any notice. The investigation had begun in 2018 over revelations that Goranov had lived rent-free in a nearly 2,000 sq. ft. apartment owned by a businessman.133
• In September, the parliament overwhelmingly passed a bill abolishing the Specialized Prosecutor’s Office in a first-reading vote, after which the legislature was dissolved before the third elections. The move, therefore, was a largely symbolic demonstration of unhappiness with the office’s poor track record.134
• At the beginning of November, 10 days before the third elections, more than 10 people were arrested over alleged irregularities in financing the construction of the Hemus motorway in Northern Bulgaria.135 Caretaker Interior Minister Rashkov made a number of allegations, including the use of shell companies and “a bank owned by Borisov” to channel the money allocated for the motorway abroad (with Borisov denying136 that he had a bank and announcing he would take Rashkov to court), alongside another allocation of 174 million BGN in advanced payments to construction companies, most of which were paid for a section of motorway that does not even have an approved route.137 Rashkov’s ministry also implicated several companies in the scheme, including Hidrostroy, which media reports have linked to Delyan Peevski. Rashkov maintains that part of the money was used for vote buying. In December, the alleged end receiver of 53 million BGN of that sum was detained and indicted over money laundering. The prosecution alleged the unnamed individual was complicit in forming a network of firms that drained money earmarked for a section of the Hemus motorway.138 The Prosecutor’s Office later announced that the individual had named people allegedly implicated in the affair.139
• Also days before the November election, the Interior Ministry published videos from 2005 of Mladen Marinov and others meeting with people from Bulgaria’s criminal underworld.140 Marinov was interior minister during the 2020 protests against the GERB-led government and subsequently elected to the Assembly. He resigned this post in 2020 at Borisov’s demand following public outrage over police violence during the demonstrations. The same videotaped meeting included cofounders of the security company Delta Guard, linked to the so-called Eight Dwarves investigation into current and former judges and prosecutors who allegedly attempted to unlawfully seize a businessman’s assets.141 Marinov was summoned by the Interior Ministry’s anti-organized-crime directorate,142 while Delta Guard’s license was revoked a few days earlier due to the indictment of one of its owners,143 although no explicit link was mentioned between the two developments.144

Author:

Angel Petrov is a journalist on the International News Desk of Dnevnik.bg, a Bulgarian news website, and covers the Balkans, the Middle East, and the post-Soviet space. He is former editor-in-chief of Sofia News Agency, an English-language news service on Bulgaria and previously the Balkans. He has also had bylines with the Financial Times, Al Jazeera, and Balkan Insight, and was part of BIRN’s Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence in 2019.