site.btaBulgarian Helsinki Committee: Unprecedented Legal Nihilism, Encroachment on Constitutional Order

The Bulgarian Helsinki Committee (BHC) described the announced joining by Bulgaria to President Trump's Board of Peace initiative as an "act of unprecedented legal nihilism and outright encroachment on the country's constitutional foundations". In a statement put out Thursday, BHC calls for immediate reversal of "this anti-constitutional decision that puts the country in international isolation and caters to the private interests of Delyan Peevski for removal of his sanctions under the US Global Magnitsky Act at the expense of national security".

Peevski, who is currently the leader of the MRF - New Beginning party, was designated in 2021 by the United States under the Global Magnitsky Act for corruption and influence peddling. He is challenging the designation in a US court, with his lawyers arguing that there is no evidence of wrongdoing. Peevski has hailed the government decision to join President Trump's initiative.

BHC also insist that the presence of the Bulgarian outgoing Prime Minister at the signing event in Davos and that an outgoing government "only has routine government functions". "Making strategic decisions that change the geo-political orientation of the country and remove it from the common European consensus is gross overstepping of the confines of the executive powers and substitution of the vote of the people," the statement goes. 

BHC further argues that the Board of Peace is an international organization and a decision to join it as within the powers of Parliament. "Beyond national regulations, Bulgaria’s allied commitments are also being violated. According to the Treaty on the European Union, Member States conduct a common foreign and security policy in a spirit of loyalty and mutual solidarity. This places us in the same group as Hungary, which is already undergoing extraordinary procedures to suspend some of its rights," say BHC, adding that the charter of the Board of Peace "reveals intent to circumvent the global system for maintaining peace, security, economic development, and social well-being of the UN".

BHC calls on members of parliament and civil society to oppose "this attempt to remove the country from Europe’s democratic family".