The draft law, authorizing widespread confiscation of illegally obtained assets without a conviction, will be altered, Bulgarian Prime Minister, Boyko Borisov, announced.

Last Friday, the majority in Bulgaria's parliament surprisingly failed to pass through a long-delayed and keenly expected bill when only 71 Members of Parliament supported it; 95 voted against and one abstained.

Not only all parliamentary groups and independent MPs voted against the bill, in exception of those from the ruling Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria party, GERB, but for the very first time GERB MPs showed discord with about 40 of them missing from plenary hall.

The opposition Bulgarian Socialist Party, BSP, called the bill Frankenstein, the ethnic Turkish party Movement for Rights and Freedoms, DPS, said it was totalitarian, the right-wing and the far-right, nationalist Ataka party were also against.

GERB MP, Emil Dimitrov, even stated the confiscation of illegally acquired assets above the sum of BGN 150 000 equals a two-bedroom apartment not located in downtown Sofia.

On Monday, Borisov told journalists that the goal of the amendments would be to provide guarantees the new law would not be used against political adversaries while such tough legislation requires more explanations to the public.

"This was the problem. In three months the bill will be back in plenary hall, after we clean the remarks coming from MPs, the Finance Ministry, and many Bulgarian lawyers," the PM stated, cited by the Bulgarian National Radio, BNR.

Interior Minister, Tsvetan Tsvetanov, said Sunday the bill must be worked on, but was adamant the main part – confiscation of illegally acquired assets will remain. He explained it was likely that the time frame when assets can be back-probed will be shortened from the current 20 years. He did not offer more detail, but pointed out tax records are to be kept for 5 years.

The leader of the right-wing Democrats for Strong Bulgaria, DSB, party and co-Chair of the right-wing Blue Coalition, Ivan Kostov, said the rightists do not want such "Bolshevik" confiscation, and advised GERB to establish an inquiry committee to probe what is happening with the State subsidies of independent MPs when they leave the party on whose ballot they have been elected.

Two days ago, President, Georgi Parvanov, called the bill weak and supported those who did not pass it.

The only official to voice disappointment was US, Ambassador, James Warlick, who issued the following statement:

"We are very disappointed upon hearing that the parliament failed to pass the asset forfeiture bill today. Non-conviction based asset forfeiture is an important tool in the fight against organized crime and corruption, and is used in countries such as the United States, UK, Italy, Australia, and Ireland. The bill that was before the parliament was approved by the Venice Commission as effective and fully consistent with democratic norms. Failure to pass this legislation is a serious setback. We hope that in the next session of Parliament the government will seek again to pass this bill in its current form."

After the Friday vote, Justice Minister Margarita Popova, who initiated and authored the bill, left plenary hall outraged and declared the texts would not be amended because they were "good enough," and the bill will be passed as is.

"Whoever wants a new bill should write it," Popova said.

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