Bulgaria sees a rise in corruption left unpunished Kathimerini - 2006/3/22
Corruption in Bulgaria, which had fallen to its lowest levels in six years, surged back in 2005 to 120,000 instances a month, most of which went unpunished, an independent watchdog on democracy said in a report yesterday. Rampant corruption and an inefficient judiciary have long been cited by European observers as the major obstacles to Bulgaria’s joining the EU in 2007. According to the report by the independent Center for the Study of Democracy (CSD) presented at a forum on corruption here, corruption fell to its lowest level since 1998 in 2004 to 80,000 instances per month. But in 2005 it made a comeback, which the CSD said could be explained by the general elections in June last year.