Bulgaria Ratifies Lisbon Treaty
In March, Bulgaria become the sixth EU member state to ratify the Treaty of Lisbon amending the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty establishing the European Community. The Lisbon Reform Treaty is the first of the founding and reform EU treaties that was signed by Bulgarian head of state and that was ratified by Bulgaria after its accession to the organization on January 1, 2007.
In June, however, the Irish voters rejected the Lisbon Treaty in a referendum, and it was also challenged in Poland, and the Czech Republic, which led to the stalling of the ratification process, whose outcome is still unclear.
Leaked OLAF Letter Reveals EU Funds Abuses in Bulgaria
In July, an official letter by the OLAF Director-General Franz-Hermann Bruener to Bulgaria's Deputy PM Meglena Plugchieva accompanied by a devastating report leaked to the press. The revealed scandalous abuses of EUR 32 M of SAPARD Program funds in Bulgaria as well as political cover-up of certain persons involved in these frauds.
The letter mentioned explicitly the so called "Nikolov-Stoykov Group" related to the notorious businessmen Mario Nikolov and Lyudmil Stoykov, who were detained a year and a half ago after OLAF alerted the Bulgarian authorities that they had drained EUR 7,5 M of SAPARD funds. Nikolov was discovered to have funded the election campaign of the current Bulgarian President Georgi Parvanov.
EC Freezes EUR 825 M of Bulgaria's EU Funds over Corruption
In July, the European Commission presented its two monitoring reports on Bulgaria - one on its progress in the interior and judicial affairs, and another one on the absorption of EU funds. These have been described as the most highly critical monitoring reports in EU's history.
In addition, the Commission stripped two of the country's government agencies allocating EU money of their accreditation. This amounted to the freezing of EUR 825 M of the pre-accession programs destined for Bulgaria.
OLAF: Up to EUR 100 M of EU Funds Abused in Bulgaria
In November, the Director of the European Anti-Fraud Office OLAF Franz-Hermann Bruener said the EU budget had incurred losses of up to EUR 100 M from the frauds with European funds in Bulgaria. Bruener first visited Sofia in August to discuss anti-corruption measures with the Bulgarian government for a three-month period.
In November, the OLAF Head said the actions of the Bulgarian government in the next three-month period would be critical for confirming his positive assessment of what had been done in Bulgaria since his August visit. The OLAF head expects more structural and staff changes on part of the Bulgarian authorities.
Bulgaria Loses Irrevocably EUR 520 of PHARE Program Funds
In November, Bulgaria lost for good EUR 520 M of EU PHARE Program funds as the European Commission refused to restore the accreditation of two of Bulgaria's PHARE executive agencies over fraud concerns.
Bulgaria lost EUR 220 M of pre-accession aid which have not even been contracted for any projects at all. Additional EUR 300 M, for which contracts have already been signed, were lost as well since this funding was frozen by the Commission in the summer, and its decision means failure to "unfreeze" it. Therefore, the Bulgarian state budget itself would now have to commit the money for the approved projects.
The accreditations of the Central Finance and Contracts Unit of Bulgaria's Finance Ministry and of the Executive Agency of the Ministry of Regional Development and Public Works were revoked by the European Commission in July over fraud allegations, and were supposed to be restored by the end of November, 2008.
EC President: Bulgaria Still Has to Tackle Corruption, Organized Crime
In December, the President of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso met with the Bulgarian Prime Minister Stanishev in Brussels. Barroso said Bulgaria had to make sure to comply with all rules in EU funds absorption, and still had to fight high-level corruption and organized crime. He promised the Commission would treat Bulgaria fairly and objectively but the meeting failed to produce any deal over Bulgaria's blocked EU funding.
In December, Barroso essentially restated what he said during his visit to Sofia in March, when he pointed out corruption and organized crime had no place in the EU, that Bulgaria was making progress but that more and clearer concrete results in the problematic areas must be achieved.
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