site.btaDomestic Violence Crime Up 15.57% in 2025, Y/Y

The 2,619 criminal offences in the context of domestic violence, recorded for 2025, were by 15.57% more than the 2,266 for 2024. These police statistics were cited here on Monday by Chief Inspector Zornitsa Shumanova, National Coordinator for Domestic Violence Matters at the Interior Ministry.

The law-enforcement official spoke at a conference on "Equality and Women's Rights: Challenges, Advocacy and Strategic Action", organized by the Bulgarian Platform European Women's Lobby.

The administrative regions of Lovech, Silistra, Razgrad, Smolyan, Shumen, Veliko Tarnovo, Pleven, Yambol and Pleven top the list in terms of the number of protection orders issued. The fewest such orders have been issued in the regions of Vidin and Sofia City, where they account for just 3 to 5% of the population, Shumanova said.

She pointed out that Bulgaria has until July 14, 2026 to transpose into its national legislation Directive (EU) 2024/1385 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 May 2024 on combating violence against women and domestic violence.

These first EU rules on tackling this type of violence were discussed at the first panel of the conference.

"A working group at the Ministry of Justice is currently tasked with transposing certain provision of the Directive into the Protection against Domestic Violence Act and into the Criminal Code," the Chief Inspector said.

The Interior Ministry keeps training police officers to deal with domestic violence cases on the ground. Last year alone, more than 2,000 officers underwent such training, Shumanova specified.

She quoted a statement issued by the the European Commission and the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy/Vice-President of the European Commission Josep Borrell, according to which "in the EU and across the world, one in three women have experienced physical or sexual violence, including abuse, harassment, rape, sexual exploitation, genital mutilation, forced marriage and femicide. Invisible despair is what many women and girls have to live with. This year [2023], the EU acceded to the Istanbul Convention, marking a major step forward in making Europe a safer place for women and girls."