Bulgarian fraud under Brussels surveillance
(Archives B2) The European Commission banged its fist on the table on Wednesday concerning Bulgaria (1). It was time. Brussels has decided to suspend the payment to Sofia of so-called pre-accession European funding intended for agriculture and regional planning – ie approximately 800 million euros. It also withdrew the accreditation of two ministerial agencies responsible for distributing and controlling these funds. But it did not touch the several billion euros distributed under the structural funds, to the delight of Sofia.
serious weaknesses
« Serious weaknesses in local, regional and central administrative and judicial capacity prevent Bulgaria from fully benefiting from EU funds " and " high-level corruption and organized crime once again exacerbate these problems of widespread weakness “, explains the Commission.
Too many unpunished cases
Bulgaria's accession was narrowly won in 2007, subject to one fundamental condition: reforming its judicial system and fighting corruption effectively. Today these problems are not always solved. " Too few results showing that the system works, too many cases go unpunished “, underlines Johannes Laitenberger, the spokesperson of the Commission.
Corruption at the highest level of the state
Explanation, less diplomatic, from someone close to the decision-making circle at the Commission, familiar with the case. " In Bulgaria, we are not dealing with the classic circuit of corruption, where a private person tries to get some advantage from an official official. Here, corruption is at the heart of the state. The one who prosecutes the corruption is often also the corrupter. We are witnessing a complete gangrene of the state, from the lowest to the highest level ».
Examples ... many
Former Defense Minister Vesselin Bliznakov, a member of the Anti-Corruption Commission (sic), may be involved in sales of military land at undervalued prices. The former Minister of the Interior could see his responsibility engaged. Five senior civil servants of his ministry are subject to legal proceedings for having rigged public contracts for their benefit! Several political leaders have not given up holding interests, direct or indirect, in companies benefiting from European funds. This is the case of the leader of the Union of Democratic Forces (right), Plamen Youroukov, whose brother-in-law owns a company benefiting from European funds. This is also the case with the Bulgarian Socialist Party (PSB), financed in large part by companies that have won calls for tenders...
The wet firecracker of the safeguard clause
Brussels could implement the safeguard clause. But it looks more like a wet firecracker. By suspending the country from the European judicial system, an expert explains, “ we will sanction the few judges who work ". The only effective way would in fact be to freeze all the European funds from which the country benefits.
(Nicolas Gros-Verheyde)
Article supplemented from the original version published in Ouest-France, September 2008
(1) The previous Commission report was 'softer'. Some Bulgarian journalists have an explanation for this relative softness from a report by former justice commissioner Franco Frattini – now Silvio Berlusconi's foreign minister. The Bulgarian Minister of the Interior at the time, Roumen Petkov had indeed warmly welcomed, in 2007, the Italian commissioner in a mountain chalet, in the ski resort of Borovetz, around a dinner " in lovely company ". A photographer had immortalized the scenes. And the photographs carefully kept in a safe place. " What would you do without Franco, the fraternal? » had moreover quipped a European diplomat.
