Report ritual
Prime Minister Boiko Borissov held forth at considerable length on July 20, reading out his Government's reaction to the European Commission's report on the performance of Bulgaria under the Co-operation and Verification Mechanism (CVM) on justice and home affairs.He pledged to implement all the report's recommendations and subtly signalled some annoyance at the customary leaks ahead of the report's release. Borissov said that he would read the report carefully to see what it said.There was no shortage of interpretations, especially from opposition parties that, in an election year, are seeking to exploit what they see as the Government's failings against organised crime and corruption.Even before the report was released, or for that matter approved, by the Commission, Bulgarian Socialist Party leader Sergei Stanishev had described it as "the worst ever" in its criticism of the Government. After the release, this sentiment was echoed by Mihail Mihov, the last interior minister in the 2005 to 2009 socialist-led government that after 2007 itself had come in for criticism in CVM reports./Source: The Sofia Echo/