Bulgaria must effectively fight corruption: Deputy PM

Bulgarian Deputy Prime Minister Meglena Kuneva here on Friday said her country must effectively fight corruption, in order to enhance citizens' trust in the institutions and the integrity of politicians.

"Bulgaria has a problem, and here I am speaking not only about the official statistics, according to which corruption in the country is high," Kuneva said while opening a discussion on the objectives, challenges and best practices in preventing and combating corruption. "Here I am speaking about two more things: integrity and trust," she said.

Politicians, people in high positions, have often lost their sense of measure and decency, Kuneva said. "We have a critical need for integrity and honesty in the execution of tasks with which we are entrusted."

Recently, Bulgaria created a new political framework and gave impetus to the fight against corruption, Kuneva said.

Kuneva reminded that the government adopted in April a five-year national anti-corruption strategy, and she was appointed national coordinator of anti-corruption policies.

Moreover, the government has established a national council on anticorruption policies, and its first meeting was to be held next week, the deputy prime minister said.

Meanwhile, her team developed a bill to combat corruption among senior public officials, which was tabled in Parliament this week, she said.

She said that according to the bill, senior public officials would have to submit detailed declarations of income and assets, and "declare more than what we have declared so far."

Correctness of the declarations would be checked, and "yes, it is entering into our personal space," Kuneva said.

A European Commission report released in January found that "corruption remains a serious issue in Bulgaria" and "there are so far very few final convictions in cases involving substantial corruption, despite the scale of the problem." Endit