Bulgaria’s SJC Prosecutors College holds Sarafov in place as acting Prosecutor-General

Meeting on March 11, the Supreme Judicial Council’s (SJC) Prosecutors College rejected a request by caretaker Minister of Justice Andrei Yankulov to appoint an acting Prosecutor-General in place of Borislav Sarafov.

As The Sofia Globe reported at the time, on February 26 a plenary of the SJC referred Yankulov’s request to the Prosecutors College, saying that it was the body competent to decide the matter.

Yankulov, who took office on February 19 as part of the interim administration ahead of Bulgaria’s early parliamentary elections, is seeking the ouster of Sarafov as a means of achieving the caretaker government’s primary task, ensuring the integrity of the elections.

The March 11 meeting of the Prosecutors College rejected Yankulov’s request unanimously, after members argued that the caretaker minister did not have the authority to propose an acting Prosecutor-General.

The Prosecutors College held to its view that legislative amendments setting a term limit of six months for acting Prosecutors-General did not apply to Sarafov – who has been in office since 2023 – because the legislation did not have a retroactive effect.

Members of the Prosecutors College even explained that they felt pressured to choose a new acting Prosecutor-General and that this was a violation of their independence.

Yankulov’s arguments for replacing Sarafov include that in three years he had not taken the necessary actions to arouse public and professional confidence in his managerial qualities, as well as that he had not fulfilled any of his own key stated goals.

At the beginning of the debate, Yankulov said the situation in which there is an alleged temporary Prosecutor-General for a third year is intolerable and it can be overcome very easily by appointing a new one.

This duration contradicts all the principles of the rule of law, Yankulov said.

“When we reflect on the events and the way the Prosecutor’s Office has been managed during this term, there are quite significant circumstances that need to be addressed,” he said.

Yankulov cited the Prosecutor’s Office’s attacks on the Supreme Court of Cassation over its rulings that after July 21 2025 Sarafov has no legitimacy as Prosecutor-General, the “incitement of public tension with excessive public statements” in the Petrohan case, as well as the controversy surrounding Bulgaria’s European Prosecutor Teodora Georgieva.

According to Yankulov, there is a disturbing trend of criminal proceedings of very high public interest “not being able to convince us that they are being conducted in the way they should be and are pursuing legal goals.”

Prosecutor Ivailo Iliev, one of the few prosecutors speaking publicly in opposition to Sarafov, told Bulgarian National Radio on March 11: “We prosecutors are called upon to follow the laws and practice of the Supreme Court, and I believe that this is the basis of law.

“The system must once again work in the way it is called on to do by law, that is, to find a way to exercise all the powers of the highest leader in the prosecution service,” Iliev said.

Yankulov also commented on the materials released on March 10 on the pre-trial proceedings for alleged corruption against Georgieva, who is currently suspended.

Yankulov asked why, if the supervising prosecutor has established evidence of a crime committed by her, she has not been charged. Why did the public find out about the case against Georgieva only when she spoke out, he asked.

Yankulov recalled that data on prosecutorial visits to the Eight Dwarfs restaurant were also transferred back to other magistrates, but that they were obviously not the subject of pre-trial proceedings.

He asked whether this means that the prosecution considers the testimonies of the same witnesses to be credible only when it depends on who they are testifying against.

Asked whether he would request information from the prosecution about other magistrates mentioned by these witnesses as guests of Petyo “The Euro” Petrov in “The Eight Dwarfs”, Yankulov said: “So I can ask the Prosecutor’s Office for more information on this topic, but whether the prosecutor’s office will provide it is a decision, as you very well know, repeatedly repeated, of the respective supervising prosecutor”.

“I have the fear that the respective supervising prosecutors only provide as much information as is favourable to the thesis that is publicly defended by the leadership of the Prosecutor’s Office,” he said.

“The Prosecutor’s Office further discredits itself with the response in which it admits that there is convincing evidence of corruption by Teodora Georgieva,” Yankulov said.

“It cannot be explained why no action was taken. If they considered the evidence not convincing, why did they send it to the European Public Prosecutor’s Office? It does not seem that the prosecutor’s office wants to clarify all the circumstances of the case,” he said.

On March 10, the Prosecutor’s Office issued a statement claiming that Yankulov, through his actions, is undermining the authority of both the Bulgarian and the European Prosecutor’s Office.

The Prosecutor’s Office said that it would inform the European Prosecutor and the institutions about the actions, which constitute ” an attempt to discredit a completed disciplinary procedure in the European Prosecutor’s Office .”

On March 8, Georgieva told Nova Televizia that she had notified the caretaker Minister of Justice about possible crimes committed by Sarafov.

As The Sofia Globe reported at the time, Georgieva reported to the Ministry of Justice “pressure, threats and undermining of the authority of the European Prosecutor’s Office by senior representatives of the Prosecutor’s Office of the Republic of Bulgaria and a political leader sanctioned for corruption by the US and United Kingdom,” the ministry said on March 6.

The statement did not name the sanctioned individual, but the only leader of a political party in Bulgaria who is subject to US and UK sanctions is Delyan Peevski, leader of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms – New Beginning.

The evening of March 10 saw the third in the latest series of large-scale public protests demanding the ouster of Sarafov.

The March 11 decision by the SJC Prosecutors College is subject to appeal in the Supreme Administrative Court within 14 days.