(from left to right): Johan Friestedt, Atanas Zafirov, Vice Prime Minister, Bertil Cottier, Ana Dzhumalieva and Genka Georgieva .

 Round Table of the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) and the Commission for Protection against Discrimnation (CPD) of Bulgaria.

 

  The event aims at offering an opportunity to discuss the findings of  ECRI’s sixth monitoring report on Bulgaria (published in October 2022) and the Conclusions on the implementation of the two priority recommendations (published in February 2025).

The roundtable was structured around three sessions:

  • ECRI’s main findings;
  • Combating racist and anti-LGBTI hate speech and hate-motivated violence;
  • Integration and inclusion of Roma

Opening statements were made by Atanas Zafirov, Vice Prime Minister and Chair of the National Council for Cooperation on Ethnic and Integration Issues, Genka Georgieva, Director General for Global Affairs at the Bulgarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Bertil Cottier, Chair of ECRI, and Ana Dzhumalieva, Chair of the CPD. ECRI’s report on Bulgaria will be presented by Jens Vedsted-Hansen, ECRI member and one of the Rapporteurs for Bulgaria.


Meeting between CPD and ECRI

In addition to representatives of the national and local authorities, the round table brought together civil society actors, as well as members of groups of concern to ECRI. This event aimed at contributing positively to the national debate on combating racism, intolerance and related discrimination in the country.

 

Documents:

Highlights of the report on Bulgaria

In its 2022 report on Bulgaria, ECRI pointed out that there was a need for a set of measures such as:

  • building on the positive actions taken by the authorities to prevent and combat antisemitism in order to take similar measures also with regard to other groups vulnerable to hate speech (such as Roma and LGBTI persons);
  • taking all necessary measures to prevent threats and violence against Roma by groups of local residents;
  • establishing dedicated hate-crime units within the police in order to work closely with the communities most affected by hate-motivated violence;
  • ensuring that no de-facto segregation of Roma children takes place in kindergartens and schools;
  • protecting Roma housing from demolitions without safeguards provided for by relevant international texts being respected;
  • increasing the number of Roma mediators and scaling up their work in the areas of health, education and employment.
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