site.btaReformist Bloc Civil Council, DSB Against Attempt to Make EC Call off CVM for Bulgaria

Reformist Bloc Civil Council, DSB  Against Attempt to Make EC Call off  CVM for Bulgaria

Sofia, March 10 (BTA) - The Civil Council of the Reformist Bloc (RB) and the Democrats for Strong Bulgaria (DSB) are against the attempt to call off the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM) for Bulgaria by the European Commission, a declaration sent to the media on Thursday said.

"We, the representatives of the RB and DSB Civil Council categorically object to the attempt of GERB, the Bulgarian Socialist Party and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms to apply political pressure on the European Commission to call off the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism for Bulgaria. Since 2007, the EC annual reports, regrettably, do not find progress of this country in the field of justice and home affairs. This is the reason for the EC not to call off the mechanism at this stage," the declaration also said.

The document further noted that CVM was imposed only on Bulgaria and Romania to make them take serious steps towards freeing the judicial system from dependencies, effectively fight corruption and guarantee the supremacy of law.

"Nine years later, parties and state institutions continue to be dependent on shadowy circles, the prosecution and the court are suspected of fulfilling political commissions, corruption is rampant, there are no convicted in the corridors of power and media freedom has been violated [Е]. All these disturbing truths have also been established in the last EC report," the document said.

The Civil Council stated that the efforts to call off the monitoring are in point of fact political pressure to stop the reforms.

"Bulgaria should avail itself of the help of its European partners in the fight against corruption, not reject it. That is why we insist that the cooperation mechanism should be expanded, not called off," the declaration said.