“I declare very clearly that from this there will be great shame for a large part of the members - or some part of the members of the SJC! Which shame will not be for the Prosecutor General and the prosecution. Fortunately, it will not be for the entire SJC.

But I think that it will have a purifying effect on the political influence in the judiciary - and I am very determined to do it for the sake of my children and the Bulgarian citizens.

Because it's time for politics to leave the judiciary.

It will definitely be interesting... And it will be useful for Bulgarian citizens and for Bulgaria, and it will be useful for the judiciary and colleagues from the judiciary.

And because I'm a prosecutor, an investigator and a police officer - trust me - not only can I say a lot, I can also prove a lot. With the relevant methods regulated in the Bulgarian legislation,” said Chief Prosecutor Ivan Geshev.

On May 8, the head of the national investigation, Borislav Sarafov, stated in his position before the Bulgarian Telegraph Agency that the prosecutor's office had long since entered the political arena and called for it to get out of there.

Sarafov and Geshev accuse each other, with the chief prosecutor asking for disciplinary proceedings to be opened against Sarafov, and he called on the judicial council to urgently remove him.

Geshev is called to give explanations at the prosecutor's office on Monday

Chief Prosecutor Ivan Geshev announced to the SJC that he was summoned next Monday to the Sofia City Prosecutor's Office to give explanations on two investigations that had been initiated.

Today, the Supreme Judicial Council is discussing the report submitted by its deputy chief prosecutor Borislav Sarafov against Geshev - for illegally recording his conversation with the member of the SJC Yordan Stoev. The chief prosecutor said that he was ready to give any explanations, but only after giving the evidence to the Sofia City Prosecutor's Office, so as not to hinder the investigation.

The SJC decided next week that the Minister of Justice will convene an extraordinary meeting, at which Ivan Geshev, his four deputies and two more female prosecutors from the Supreme Cassation Prosecutor's Office, who are said to have attended an operation in Geshev's office this Monday, will be heard.

The SJC is also discussing how the training resort of the prosecutor's office in Borovets is used, after Borislav Sarafov announced that Ivan Geshev was using it for personal purposes. Geshev declared that all resorts of the prosecutor's office are used according to the rules of the institution and with the corresponding payment. According to him, this can be proven with documents, and both prosecutors and members of the SJC, as well as people outside the judicial system, have stayed in this resort.

Some of the members of the SJC themselves declared that they stayed at the resortin Borovets. They indicated that its condition was very good and that they had no impression that Borislav Sarafov's claims were true.

Earlier, Ivan Geshev announced to the members of the council that he will go on leave for personal reasons. Before the start of the session, the president of the Supreme Court of Cassation, Galina Zakharova, described the situation in the judiciary as extremely alarming.

"The proposal of the six colleagues from the prosecutor's collegium puts us at the beginning of a procedure for early termination of the powers of the chief prosecutor. This legal possibility is extremely succinctly formulated in the law. That is why the SJC has drawn up rules to follow," Zakharova said.

Her colleague Georgi Cholakov commented that what is happening does not help to establish trust in the judicial system.

"Relevant evidence must be collected. The Procurator's College, if referred to a request by the disciplinary panel, can decide on a temporary suspension for a period of up to 3 months," he explained.

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