“There is an urgent need for considerable improvements in accountability and professional practice within the judiciary and the investigative authorities in order to achieve convincing results in the fight against corruption and organized crime,” said the report.
According to the report, police targeted 171 organized crime suspects between July 2010 and March 2011, but only 16 were sentenced to prison terms. The struggle against combating high-level organized crime “has not yet led to convincing results, the report concluded.”
But it was the Bulgarian judicial system that garnered the harshest criticism. The report said that while the Bulgarian government has shown “determination and commitment in driving the reform process,” its judiciary “has yet to show a real commitment to thorough judicial reform as slow progress is not just the result of shortcomings in judicial practice and in the Penal Code.”
The report said the judicial appointment process, “still lack(s) the necessary level of transparency and credibility” and that officials do not do enough to systematically investigate allegations against magistrates.
Ministry of Interior reforms, especially reorganizations within the police forces have streamlined investigations, the report said. However, they said progress in evidence collection, witness protection, and white collar crime prosecution is unsatisfactory. Lack of sufficient funding is one reason for this.
The authors point out a number of as yet unmet requirements, including legislation permitting confiscation of illegally-acquired assets without a guilty conviction, and stronger sanctions for offenders.
Romania received a more positive assessment. According to the report, the government made “significant steps to improve the efficiency” of judicial procedures.
Brussels still sees room for improvement, citing a need to “accelerate a number of important high-level corruption trials and to prevent their collapse because of reaching statute-barred period.”
This report is part of the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism, the way in which Brussels monitors the progress Bulgaria and Romania are making in justice and home affairs. Reforms pursuant to the agreement are a precondition for Schengen entry. It is the last before the EU’s anticipated 2012 decision whether or not to continue monitoring the two countries.
In Bulgaria, the report arrives against a backdrop of a looming no-confidence vote against the ruling coalition, whose detractors say they have failed their constituents in security and home affairs.
