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HRF classifies Bulgaria as democratic.
Bulgaria is a parliamentary republic with a 240-member unicameral National Assembly. The President, elected to a 5-year term, is the nominal head of state but primarily holds ceremonial functions and has limited veto powers. Bulgaria democratized in 1989, following nearly 45 years of Communist rule, and established a dynamic party system and competitive elections. The country joined NATO in 2004 and the European Union in 2007. While Bulgaria has made significant strides in consolidating its democracy since 1989, it continues to grapple with corruption, graft, and entrenched clientelism. The Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) and the Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria (GERB) dominated domestic politics after the turn of the century. The end of the latter’s nearly uninterrupted 12-year run in office in 2021 reflected declining popular support and growing disaffection with its perceived clientelism and abuses of public resources. Emerging parties that initially capitalized upon GERB’s decline in subsequent elections were ultimately unable to form stable governing coalitions. As a result, Bulgaria held seven snap elections between 2021 and 2024. The last of these, which took place in October 2024, resulted in GERB’s short-lived return to office in a controversial minority coalition with the Socialists (BSP) and the right-leaning populist There Is Such a People (ITN), informally backed by DPS-New Beginning. Massive protests denouncing the proposed 2026 state budget ultimately compelled the cabinet to resign in December 2025.
National elections are largely free and fair. The Citizens for European Development (GERB) party was almost uninterruptedly in power between 2009 and 2021, despite sustained popular protests denouncing its policies and role in enabling corruption in 2013 and 2020. Following the April 2021 parliamentary elections, which saw new anti-establishment parties that had sharply criticized GERB gain close to a majority of seats, the former ruling party was politically isolated and unable to form a cabinet. Subsequent governments have proved short-lived, however: Bulgaria held six more elections between July 2021 and October 2024, with another forthcoming in the spring of 2026. While international observers have assessed all of these elections positively overall, concerns regarding the misuse of administrative resources and isolated instances of illicit voter mobilization persist.
Independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and members of the general public are largely free to openly criticize or challenge the government. However, the main media regulator, the Council for Electronic Media (SEM), and the national broadcaster (BNT) and radio (BNR), remain susceptible to overt political influence. The concentration of media ownership in the hands of political elites and their allies, and a culture of editorial interference, have also threatened media freedom in recent years. Still, a number of private, independent outlets continue to provide critical political coverage, reaching a wide audience. Civil society is robust in Bulgaria, albeit somewhat constrained in a shrinking civic space, and freedom of assembly is generally upheld in practice, with few notable exceptions in recent years.
Institutions are independent and largely serve as effective checks on the government. The courts generally uphold the freedom of dissent in their rulings, preventing political elites from silencing critics through arbitrary lawsuits or other forms of intimidation, and provide an effective remedy in election disputes. At the same time, an ineffective and politically subservient prosecution contributes to ongoing impunity for high-profile corruption. Concerns of overt political interference in the functioning of key regulatory bodies, from media watchdogs to investigative agencies, persist.
In Bulgaria, national elections are largely free and fair. In spite of the generally sound administration of the vote, however, some political actors, particularly GERB, continue to benefit from unfair campaign advantages, such as patronage networks within the civil service and editorial influence in the mainstream media. Nonetheless, the recent electoral victories of relatively new political parties suggest the mainstream opposition can campaign unobstructed and successfully challenge incumbents. Electoral irregularities, while concerningly persistent, are sporadic and unlikely to skew the outcome in favour of any particular political actor.
The dominant GERB party has long benefitted from significant unfair campaign advantages, irrespective of whether it is in government or opposition, owing to the entrenched patron-client networks in the civil service, local administrations, and business circles it established during its 12-year run in office. Throughout its long tenure, the party had frequently awarded lucrative public tenders to allied businesses and passed legislation favorable to their interests, such as the much-criticized deregulation of the gambling industry. In addition, GERB has weaponized state agencies, such as the Specialized Public Prosecutor’s Office, to harass or extort private companies. Finally, GERB extensively pursued clientelist employment practices in the civil service (which nearly doubled in size while the party was in office) and has frequently relied on public servants’ support, coaxed or voluntary, to gain an upper hand in national and local elections. International observers, such as the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), have repeatedly noted the party’s abuse of administrative resources and disproportionate representation in the mainstream media. For instance, in the April 2021 regular elections, the national broadcaster BNT provided no editorial coverage of the electoral campaign, citing a narrow interpretation of the national Radio and Television Act. At the same time, it continued to extensively cover the activities of the incumbent GERB government in an overwhelmingly positive light. In addition, the party introduced extraordinary one-time welfare payments to vulnerable groups (totaling about $1.7 billion) shortly before the April 2021 parliamentary election, allegedly to address some of the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Observers, including the OSCE, criticized the measure as a form of unfair voter mobilization that blurred the line between state and party. While international experts have not noted comparable abuses of administrative resources in subsequent elections, concerns regarding loopholes in campaign finance laws and unclear procedures for electoral dispute resolution persist.
The government has not unfairly and significantly hindered a real, mainstream opposition party or candidate’s electoral campaign, as indicated by the swift rise of new political actors following the ouster of GERB in April 2021. These newly institutionalized parties, whose platforms largely rested on undoing the backsliding wrought by the outgoing government, have enjoyed significant, but typically short-lived, surges in popularity. For example, the populist There is Such a People (ITN), led by a former talk show host, won the July 2021 snap election (with 24.08% of the popular vote) while the centrist-technocratic We Continue the Change (PP), founded just two months prior, came first in the subsequent snap vote, in November 2021, with 25.67%. While achieving significant electoral upsets, these parties could not ultimately sustain stable coalition governments without GERB. As indicated by the unprecedented number of snap elections since 2021, the political landscape remains exceptionally volatile. GERB briefly returned to office following the last snap election, in October 2024, forming a minority government that also proved short-lived. While seemingly stable, this government configuration proved short-lived, as massive protests (the largest since the fall of Communism, according to some estimates) against its proposed 2026 budget forced its resignation in December 2025.
International observers have assessed the administration of elections positively overall, indicating the absence of widespread or systemic irregularities. Nonetheless, in multiple electoral cycles (e.g., the October 2024 parliamentary election), both the DPS and GERB faced allegations of orchestrating vote-buying schemes among vulnerable communities (such as Roma, Bulgarian Turks, and residents of sparsely populated areas). However, few of those claims have been effectively investigated, and still fewer perpetrators have been brought to justice: a 2024 journalistic investigation revealed that between 2021 and 2024 (which saw multiple snap elections), only 21 investigations reached trial, and 11 individuals were convicted for vote-buying, typically at a small scale. Although concerning, these irregularities are not ubiquitous enough to jeopardize the overall integrity of elections or substantively alter the outcome.
Since Bulgaria democratized in 1989, independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and members of the general public have been largely free to openly criticize or challenge the government. Nonetheless, key regulators’ susceptibility to overt political influence, the concentration of ownership, and the sporadic legal harassment of critical journalists have negatively impacted the media sector in recent years. Civic space has been shrinking, owing in no small part to the political elite’s hostile rhetoric towards CSOs and periodic renewed proposals for repressive legislation, but civil society remains robust. Authorities have also generally upheld the freedom of assembly, despite some concerning instances to the contrary at mass anti-government protests in the 2020s.
While in office, GERB somewhat manipulated media coverage in its favor, largely by installing loyalists at the helm of the Council for Electronic Media (SEM), the main regulatory body that licenses electronic outlets and oversees their compliance with certain content restrictions. Three out of SEM’s five members are parliamentary appointees. The Council, in turn, selects the General Directors of national television (BNT) and radio (BNR). During GERB’s tenure (2009-2021), controversial appointments to these bodies helped secure markedly pro-government coverage. In 2019, Emil Koshlukov, a journalist previously involved with channels owned by far-right political parties allied with GERB, was appointed Director General of the BNT. Shortly after, several programs that had criticized the government were taken off the air, while BNT employees increasingly spoke out about a culture of editorial interference. In some instances, the channel interrupted its regular programming to broadcast GERB’s press conferences live, a prerogative not granted to any other party. Although Koshlukov’s formal three-year term already ended, he has remained at his post due to SEM’s ostensible repeated inability to select a suitable successor with the requisite majority of votes. A new candidate review cycle is expected in early 2026. Bulgaria suffered an erosion of media freedom in the 2010s due to the concentration and intransparency of media ownership, which has somewhat improved since 2020. For much of the prior decade, Delyan Peevski, a politician and oligarch sanctioned by the US Department of the Treasury under the Global Magnitsky program for high-level corruption, had an effective monopoly on the printing and distribution of newspapers in the country, controlling up to 80% of the market. Reflecting the significant diversification and growing editorial independence of the sector following Peeveski’s gradual exit between 2019 and 2020, Bulgaria’s rankings on the Reporters without Borders (RSF) improved substantially – from a historic low, 112th out of 180 places, in 2021, to 59th place in 2024. Rebounding media pluralism is also evident in more than 150 TV channels and more than 240 print outlets, most of which are independent.
The government has not unfairly shut down independent, dissenting organizations. With more than 15,000 CSOs active as of 2023, Bulgaria has a diverse civil society. Sporadic attempts by far-right groups to introduce repressive “foreign agents” laws, such as a draft bill submitted by the Vazrazhdane (Revival) party in 2022 and again in 2024 following minor revisions, have failed to gain support in Parliament or among the general public.
The government has not systematically, seriously, and unfairly repressed protests or gatherings. Authorities generally respect the freedom of assembly, though there have been a few notable recent exceptions. In July of 2020, during one of the peaceful public demonstrations denouncing GERB’s government, law enforcement violently beat and arrested about two dozen peaceful participants. It wasn’t until 2021 that leaked recordings of the nearby Council of Ministers’ security cameras revealed the true extent and gravity of police violence and compelled the Ministry of the Interior to undertake an internal investigation. Though the Prosecution eventually pressed charges against several police officers, flagrant omissions of evidence and flaws in the investigation, as of 2024, precluded true accountability. None of the perpetrators has been sanctioned by the courts. Despite these limited exceptions, most public gatherings, which are frequent and cover a range of subjects, proceed without undue interference.
Bulgarian institutions are mostly independent and largely serve as effective checks on the government. Formally, the judiciary meets the EU’s overall rule-of-law standards and has upheld electoral integrity and the freedom of dissent in most instances. The key outstanding challenges are the ongoing erosion of the prosecution’s functional independence and credibility, which also contribute to impunity for high-level corruption, and the partiality or limited capacity of important regulatory bodies overseeing the media, fair market competition, and digital privacy, among other policy areas.
The government has not systematically subjected judicial institutions to reforms that abolish or seriously weaken their independence or operational effectiveness. In fact, successive administrations had an obligation to continue advancing the rule of law under the terms of the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM), which the EU established to monitor progress in judicial reform in Bulgaria and Romania after their 2007 accession. In September 2023, the CVM was closed, indicating both had largely met key benchmarks regarding judicial independence, anti-corruption, and measures against organized crime. Nonetheless, some issues in the appointment of high-ranking magistrates persist. For instance, some experts have criticized the fact that 11 out of 25 members of the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC), responsible for appointing, transferring, and dismissing prosecutors and judges in the lower courts, are appointed by Parliament, underscoring a potential for undue political interference. However, international observers, including experts from the Venice Commission, have repeatedly criticized the office of the Prosecutor General for lacking any effective oversight, except for the officeholder’s direct dismissal by the SJC through a majority vote. The Prosecutor General is nominated by the Minister of Justice and confirmed by the SJC and has broad discretion to initiate, extend, and discontinue investigations. GERB filled the office with loyalists with questionable professional credentials, including Ivan Geshev, who was appointed Deputy Prosecutor General in 2019. Geshev was repeatedly criticized for his failure to initiate investigations against credibly implicated officials (some of whom were sanctioned under the US Global Magnitsky sanctions program), while abusing the vast prerogatives of his office to intimidate unfavorable members of the business elite or the opposition. For example, in 2021, it transpired that he had likely personally sanctioned the wiretapping of opposition leaders during the 2020 mass anti-government protests. Geshev’s tenure ended only after a rift between him and GERB’s leadership became publicly apparent in 2023, when a hastily convened Judicial Council voted 16-9 in favor of his dismissal.
The GERB-led government also pursued certain reforms that seriously weakened the independence and operational effectiveness of executive institutions. In October 2025, parliament voted to remove the president’s role in appointing the head of the powerful State Agency for National Security (DANS), transferring the prerogatives of nomination and confirmation to the Council of Ministers and parliament instead. The reform, widely perceived as a maneuver in GERB’s ongoing power struggle against then-president Rumen Radev, will likely further compromise the agency, which has been persistently criticized for its role in surveilling political opponents while shielding officials from accountability. A number of formally independent oversight bodies, including the Data Protection Agency and the Commission for the Protection of Competition (CPC), have also exhibited political bias, enabling officials to abuse administrative resources for personal gain.
As a result of these patterns of institutional capture, institutions have occasionally failed to hold government officials accountable. A prime example was the Specialized Public Prosecutor’s Office, dissolved by parliament in 2022 for its failure to tackle high-profile corruption: out of nearly 300 cases it oversaw in 2020, only 56 reached trial at all, and five lower-profile cases resulted in a guilty verdict. These defects of the prosecution have allowed at least a dozen individuals implicated in corruption and sanctioned under the US Global Magnitsky sanctions program to evade accountability domestically. They include Delyan Peevski, mentioned above, and former Minister of Finance and GERB member Vladimir Goranov. The US Department of the Treasury found Goranov facilitated tens of millions of US dollars in bribes to GERB MPs in exchange for favorable legislation benefiting the gambling industry. According to some estimates, the scheme led to a loss of about $300 million in tax revenues over a five-year period.
The courts have generally upheld electoral integrity and the freedom of dissent in their rulings. Despite some shortcomings of the Election Code, such as the vaguely defined procedures for challenging decisions of the Central Election Commission (CEC), Bulgaria’s electoral dispute resolution system is sound overall, according to OSCE assessments. The Supreme Administrative Court (SAC), which reviews appeals to the CEC’s decisions, also largely guarantees an effective legal remedy. Still, substandard initial investigations and lengthy court proceedings undermine accountability for vote-buying and other forms of illicit voter mobilization. According to data from the Office of the Prosecutor General, only 1 in 4 such cases that reach the trial stage result in a conviction. The courts have also not enabled political and business elites’ attempts to repress criticism, as evident from the large proportion of strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs) resolved in favor of journalists and activists. A 2023 report by the local watchdog group Anti-Corruption Fund, which monitored such lawsuits between 2000 and 2023, found that plaintiffs were unsuccessful in close to 90% of cases. Equally important, the courts have generally applied free speech principles established by the European Court of Human Rights, such as the heightened scrutiny applicable to public officials.
HRF classifies Bulgaria as democratic.
Bulgaria is a parliamentary republic with a 240-member unicameral National Assembly. The President, elected to a 5-year term, is the nominal head of state but primarily holds ceremonial functions and has limited veto powers. Bulgaria democratized in 1989, following nearly 45 years of Communist rule, and established a dynamic party system and competitive elections. The country joined NATO in 2004 and the European Union in 2007. While Bulgaria has made significant strides in consolidating its democracy since 1989, it continues to grapple with corruption, graft, and entrenched clientelism. The Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) and the Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria (GERB) dominated domestic politics after the turn of the century. The end of the latter’s nearly uninterrupted 12-year run in office in 2021 reflected declining popular support and growing disaffection with its perceived clientelism and abuses of public resources. Emerging parties that initially capitalized upon GERB’s decline in subsequent elections were ultimately unable to form stable governing coalitions. As a result, Bulgaria held seven snap elections between 2021 and 2024. The last of these, which took place in October 2024, resulted in GERB’s short-lived return to office in a controversial minority coalition with the Socialists (BSP) and the right-leaning populist There Is Such a People (ITN), informally backed by DPS-New Beginning. Massive protests denouncing the proposed 2026 state budget ultimately compelled the cabinet to resign in December 2025.
National elections are largely free and fair. The Citizens for European Development (GERB) party was almost uninterruptedly in power between 2009 and 2021, despite sustained popular protests denouncing its policies and role in enabling corruption in 2013 and 2020. Following the April 2021 parliamentary elections, which saw new anti-establishment parties that had sharply criticized GERB gain close to a majority of seats, the former ruling party was politically isolated and unable to form a cabinet. Subsequent governments have proved short-lived, however: Bulgaria held six more elections between July 2021 and October 2024, with another forthcoming in the spring of 2026. While international observers have assessed all of these elections positively overall, concerns regarding the misuse of administrative resources and isolated instances of illicit voter mobilization persist.
Independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and members of the general public are largely free to openly criticize or challenge the government. However, the main media regulator, the Council for Electronic Media (SEM), and the national broadcaster (BNT) and radio (BNR), remain susceptible to overt political influence. The concentration of media ownership in the hands of political elites and their allies, and a culture of editorial interference, have also threatened media freedom in recent years. Still, a number of private, independent outlets continue to provide critical political coverage, reaching a wide audience. Civil society is robust in Bulgaria, albeit somewhat constrained in a shrinking civic space, and freedom of assembly is generally upheld in practice, with few notable exceptions in recent years.
Institutions are independent and largely serve as effective checks on the government. The courts generally uphold the freedom of dissent in their rulings, preventing political elites from silencing critics through arbitrary lawsuits or other forms of intimidation, and provide an effective remedy in election disputes. At the same time, an ineffective and politically subservient prosecution contributes to ongoing impunity for high-profile corruption. Concerns of overt political interference in the functioning of key regulatory bodies, from media watchdogs to investigative agencies, persist.
In Bulgaria, national elections are largely free and fair. In spite of the generally sound administration of the vote, however, some political actors, particularly GERB, continue to benefit from unfair campaign advantages, such as patronage networks within the civil service and editorial influence in the mainstream media. Nonetheless, the recent electoral victories of relatively new political parties suggest the mainstream opposition can campaign unobstructed and successfully challenge incumbents. Electoral irregularities, while concerningly persistent, are sporadic and unlikely to skew the outcome in favour of any particular political actor.
The dominant GERB party has long benefitted from significant unfair campaign advantages, irrespective of whether it is in government or opposition, owing to the entrenched patron-client networks in the civil service, local administrations, and business circles it established during its 12-year run in office. Throughout its long tenure, the party had frequently awarded lucrative public tenders to allied businesses and passed legislation favorable to their interests, such as the much-criticized deregulation of the gambling industry. In addition, GERB has weaponized state agencies, such as the Specialized Public Prosecutor’s Office, to harass or extort private companies. Finally, GERB extensively pursued clientelist employment practices in the civil service (which nearly doubled in size while the party was in office) and has frequently relied on public servants’ support, coaxed or voluntary, to gain an upper hand in national and local elections. International observers, such as the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), have repeatedly noted the party’s abuse of administrative resources and disproportionate representation in the mainstream media. For instance, in the April 2021 regular elections, the national broadcaster BNT provided no editorial coverage of the electoral campaign, citing a narrow interpretation of the national Radio and Television Act. At the same time, it continued to extensively cover the activities of the incumbent GERB government in an overwhelmingly positive light. In addition, the party introduced extraordinary one-time welfare payments to vulnerable groups (totaling about $1.7 billion) shortly before the April 2021 parliamentary election, allegedly to address some of the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Observers, including the OSCE, criticized the measure as a form of unfair voter mobilization that blurred the line between state and party. While international experts have not noted comparable abuses of administrative resources in subsequent elections, concerns regarding loopholes in campaign finance laws and unclear procedures for electoral dispute resolution persist.
The government has not unfairly and significantly hindered a real, mainstream opposition party or candidate’s electoral campaign, as indicated by the swift rise of new political actors following the ouster of GERB in April 2021. These newly institutionalized parties, whose platforms largely rested on undoing the backsliding wrought by the outgoing government, have enjoyed significant, but typically short-lived, surges in popularity. For example, the populist There is Such a People (ITN), led by a former talk show host, won the July 2021 snap election (with 24.08% of the popular vote) while the centrist-technocratic We Continue the Change (PP), founded just two months prior, came first in the subsequent snap vote, in November 2021, with 25.67%. While achieving significant electoral upsets, these parties could not ultimately sustain stable coalition governments without GERB. As indicated by the unprecedented number of snap elections since 2021, the political landscape remains exceptionally volatile. GERB briefly returned to office following the last snap election, in October 2024, forming a minority government that also proved short-lived. While seemingly stable, this government configuration proved short-lived, as massive protests (the largest since the fall of Communism, according to some estimates) against its proposed 2026 budget forced its resignation in December 2025.
International observers have assessed the administration of elections positively overall, indicating the absence of widespread or systemic irregularities. Nonetheless, in multiple electoral cycles (e.g., the October 2024 parliamentary election), both the DPS and GERB faced allegations of orchestrating vote-buying schemes among vulnerable communities (such as Roma, Bulgarian Turks, and residents of sparsely populated areas). However, few of those claims have been effectively investigated, and still fewer perpetrators have been brought to justice: a 2024 journalistic investigation revealed that between 2021 and 2024 (which saw multiple snap elections), only 21 investigations reached trial, and 11 individuals were convicted for vote-buying, typically at a small scale. Although concerning, these irregularities are not ubiquitous enough to jeopardize the overall integrity of elections or substantively alter the outcome.
Since Bulgaria democratized in 1989, independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and members of the general public have been largely free to openly criticize or challenge the government. Nonetheless, key regulators’ susceptibility to overt political influence, the concentration of ownership, and the sporadic legal harassment of critical journalists have negatively impacted the media sector in recent years. Civic space has been shrinking, owing in no small part to the political elite’s hostile rhetoric towards CSOs and periodic renewed proposals for repressive legislation, but civil society remains robust. Authorities have also generally upheld the freedom of assembly, despite some concerning instances to the contrary at mass anti-government protests in the 2020s.
While in office, GERB somewhat manipulated media coverage in its favor, largely by installing loyalists at the helm of the Council for Electronic Media (SEM), the main regulatory body that licenses electronic outlets and oversees their compliance with certain content restrictions. Three out of SEM’s five members are parliamentary appointees. The Council, in turn, selects the General Directors of national television (BNT) and radio (BNR). During GERB’s tenure (2009-2021), controversial appointments to these bodies helped secure markedly pro-government coverage. In 2019, Emil Koshlukov, a journalist previously involved with channels owned by far-right political parties allied with GERB, was appointed Director General of the BNT. Shortly after, several programs that had criticized the government were taken off the air, while BNT employees increasingly spoke out about a culture of editorial interference. In some instances, the channel interrupted its regular programming to broadcast GERB’s press conferences live, a prerogative not granted to any other party. Although Koshlukov’s formal three-year term already ended, he has remained at his post due to SEM’s ostensible repeated inability to select a suitable successor with the requisite majority of votes. A new candidate review cycle is expected in early 2026. Bulgaria suffered an erosion of media freedom in the 2010s due to the concentration and intransparency of media ownership, which has somewhat improved since 2020. For much of the prior decade, Delyan Peevski, a politician and oligarch sanctioned by the US Department of the Treasury under the Global Magnitsky program for high-level corruption, had an effective monopoly on the printing and distribution of newspapers in the country, controlling up to 80% of the market. Reflecting the significant diversification and growing editorial independence of the sector following Peeveski’s gradual exit between 2019 and 2020, Bulgaria’s rankings on the Reporters without Borders (RSF) improved substantially – from a historic low, 112th out of 180 places, in 2021, to 59th place in 2024. Rebounding media pluralism is also evident in more than 150 TV channels and more than 240 print outlets, most of which are independent.
The government has not unfairly shut down independent, dissenting organizations. With more than 15,000 CSOs active as of 2023, Bulgaria has a diverse civil society. Sporadic attempts by far-right groups to introduce repressive “foreign agents” laws, such as a draft bill submitted by the Vazrazhdane (Revival) party in 2022 and again in 2024 following minor revisions, have failed to gain support in Parliament or among the general public.
The government has not systematically, seriously, and unfairly repressed protests or gatherings. Authorities generally respect the freedom of assembly, though there have been a few notable recent exceptions. In July of 2020, during one of the peaceful public demonstrations denouncing GERB’s government, law enforcement violently beat and arrested about two dozen peaceful participants. It wasn’t until 2021 that leaked recordings of the nearby Council of Ministers’ security cameras revealed the true extent and gravity of police violence and compelled the Ministry of the Interior to undertake an internal investigation. Though the Prosecution eventually pressed charges against several police officers, flagrant omissions of evidence and flaws in the investigation, as of 2024, precluded true accountability. None of the perpetrators has been sanctioned by the courts. Despite these limited exceptions, most public gatherings, which are frequent and cover a range of subjects, proceed without undue interference.
Bulgarian institutions are mostly independent and largely serve as effective checks on the government. Formally, the judiciary meets the EU’s overall rule-of-law standards and has upheld electoral integrity and the freedom of dissent in most instances. The key outstanding challenges are the ongoing erosion of the prosecution’s functional independence and credibility, which also contribute to impunity for high-level corruption, and the partiality or limited capacity of important regulatory bodies overseeing the media, fair market competition, and digital privacy, among other policy areas.
The government has not systematically subjected judicial institutions to reforms that abolish or seriously weaken their independence or operational effectiveness. In fact, successive administrations had an obligation to continue advancing the rule of law under the terms of the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM), which the EU established to monitor progress in judicial reform in Bulgaria and Romania after their 2007 accession. In September 2023, the CVM was closed, indicating both had largely met key benchmarks regarding judicial independence, anti-corruption, and measures against organized crime. Nonetheless, some issues in the appointment of high-ranking magistrates persist. For instance, some experts have criticized the fact that 11 out of 25 members of the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC), responsible for appointing, transferring, and dismissing prosecutors and judges in the lower courts, are appointed by Parliament, underscoring a potential for undue political interference. However, international observers, including experts from the Venice Commission, have repeatedly criticized the office of the Prosecutor General for lacking any effective oversight, except for the officeholder’s direct dismissal by the SJC through a majority vote. The Prosecutor General is nominated by the Minister of Justice and confirmed by the SJC and has broad discretion to initiate, extend, and discontinue investigations. GERB filled the office with loyalists with questionable professional credentials, including Ivan Geshev, who was appointed Deputy Prosecutor General in 2019. Geshev was repeatedly criticized for his failure to initiate investigations against credibly implicated officials (some of whom were sanctioned under the US Global Magnitsky sanctions program), while abusing the vast prerogatives of his office to intimidate unfavorable members of the business elite or the opposition. For example, in 2021, it transpired that he had likely personally sanctioned the wiretapping of opposition leaders during the 2020 mass anti-government protests. Geshev’s tenure ended only after a rift between him and GERB’s leadership became publicly apparent in 2023, when a hastily convened Judicial Council voted 16-9 in favor of his dismissal.
The GERB-led government also pursued certain reforms that seriously weakened the independence and operational effectiveness of executive institutions. In October 2025, parliament voted to remove the president’s role in appointing the head of the powerful State Agency for National Security (DANS), transferring the prerogatives of nomination and confirmation to the Council of Ministers and parliament instead. The reform, widely perceived as a maneuver in GERB’s ongoing power struggle against then-president Rumen Radev, will likely further compromise the agency, which has been persistently criticized for its role in surveilling political opponents while shielding officials from accountability. A number of formally independent oversight bodies, including the Data Protection Agency and the Commission for the Protection of Competition (CPC), have also exhibited political bias, enabling officials to abuse administrative resources for personal gain.
As a result of these patterns of institutional capture, institutions have occasionally failed to hold government officials accountable. A prime example was the Specialized Public Prosecutor’s Office, dissolved by parliament in 2022 for its failure to tackle high-profile corruption: out of nearly 300 cases it oversaw in 2020, only 56 reached trial at all, and five lower-profile cases resulted in a guilty verdict. These defects of the prosecution have allowed at least a dozen individuals implicated in corruption and sanctioned under the US Global Magnitsky sanctions program to evade accountability domestically. They include Delyan Peevski, mentioned above, and former Minister of Finance and GERB member Vladimir Goranov. The US Department of the Treasury found Goranov facilitated tens of millions of US dollars in bribes to GERB MPs in exchange for favorable legislation benefiting the gambling industry. According to some estimates, the scheme led to a loss of about $300 million in tax revenues over a five-year period.
The courts have generally upheld electoral integrity and the freedom of dissent in their rulings. Despite some shortcomings of the Election Code, such as the vaguely defined procedures for challenging decisions of the Central Election Commission (CEC), Bulgaria’s electoral dispute resolution system is sound overall, according to OSCE assessments. The Supreme Administrative Court (SAC), which reviews appeals to the CEC’s decisions, also largely guarantees an effective legal remedy. Still, substandard initial investigations and lengthy court proceedings undermine accountability for vote-buying and other forms of illicit voter mobilization. According to data from the Office of the Prosecutor General, only 1 in 4 such cases that reach the trial stage result in a conviction. The courts have also not enabled political and business elites’ attempts to repress criticism, as evident from the large proportion of strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs) resolved in favor of journalists and activists. A 2023 report by the local watchdog group Anti-Corruption Fund, which monitored such lawsuits between 2000 and 2023, found that plaintiffs were unsuccessful in close to 90% of cases. Equally important, the courts have generally applied free speech principles established by the European Court of Human Rights, such as the heightened scrutiny applicable to public officials.
