Prosecutor’s Office Reported 80 Preliminary Legal Proceedings Connected with the EU Funds

The National Assembly listened to the annual report for Prosecutor's office activities in 2007 of the respective parliamentary committee. The percentage of crimes solved in 2007 is 52%, a downtrend compared to 53% in 2006 and 60% in 2005, Yanaki Stoilov reported, cited by Information Agency Focus.

Prosecutor General Boris Velchev also announced that 80 preliminary proceedings have been open related to the EU finds. "There are bills of indictment on many of the proceedings and there are even verdicts on some of them", the Prosecutor General explained. He could not give the exact number of the verdicts and made it clear that the authorities are now gaining experience in this field to be able to oppose to this type of crime more effectively in the future.

"Many crimes are committed in the country and the authorities act with limited resources", Velchev said. He emphasized that this fact should be taken into account by the management of the Ministry of Interior as well as by the prosecutor's office.

A 3 per cent reduction of the number of court hearings is observed. The number of convicted persons or the ones against whom sanctions were imposed is 50714. The number equals to 91% of the ones brought to court. Their number had decreased by 10%.

A downtrend can also be observed in the number of immediate or speedy proceedings with 19% in comparison with 2006 and 43% in 2005. As a result of the decrease in registered crime there is also an 11% decrease in the number of prosecutor indictments.