US Department of State Report References ACF: Criminal Proceedings in Bulgaria Fail to Tackle High-Level Corruption

The Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor of the US Department of State has published its annual human rights report for 2022.

Section Four of the country report on Bulgaria titled “Corruption and Lack of Transparency in Government” has quoted the main conclusion of ACF’s annual monitoring report for 2022: “the criminal justice proceedings conducted by the authorities were inadequate to address the actual corruption level in the public sector, which concealed the real scale of high-level government corruption”.

The State Department report also referenced data presented by ACF about the 49 investigations against high-profile former ministers, deputy ministers, National Assembly members, magistrates, mayors, and regional governors on charges of suspected high-level corruption. In the previous six years, only three investigations had resulted in convictions and 14 in not guilty verdicts.

The report states that “while the law provides criminal penalties for corruption by officials, the government did not implement the law effectively, and officials in all branches of government reportedly engaged in corrupt practices with impunity”.