MINELRES: Bulgaria: HRP on adoption of anti-discrimination law

[MINELRES moderator]

Original sender: Emil Cohen <emilcohen@mbox.cit.bg>


HUMAN RIGHTS PROJECT*

PRESS RELEASE

Bulgaria Made Important Step for Elimination of the Discrimination 

Sofia, September 19, 03 - On Tuesday the Parliament of Bulgaria adopted
the first in the legislative history of the country Law of Protection
against Discrimination. The Law is in accordance with the requirements
of the Directive 2000/43 of the European Commission. The passing of such
a law is a precondition for the joining of Bulgaria the European Union
that is scheduled for 2007. 

The Bill: 

- Prohibits any discriminations on the grounds of age, gender, ethnical
belonging and/or origin, education, family status and property status; 

- Prohibits any discrimination in the spheres of labor, education,
access to social services etc. The employers have a duty to provide
their staff with equal reward for equal efforts. Beside this the
employers have to give equal possibilities for education and increasing
of the level of qualification for all their personnel without any
preferences; 

- Introduces a duty for the employers to encourage persons who belong to
all groups that are not properly presented to apply for a job. Beside
this the employers according to the new Bill are obliged immediately to
check the situation and to take all necessary actions for overcoming of
the existing discrimination if someone have a complaint on that
occasion;

- Introduces a requirement for equal representation of the genders and
obliges the employers to take actions for reaching at least forty
percent representation of the gender that is underrepresented. 

- Establishes a special body � Commission on Prevention of
Discrimination � with a duty to supervise the implementation of the
provisions of the Law. That body will have nine members who will be
elected for five years. The National Assembly will elect five of the
members and the President will appoint four of them; 

- The Commission will be able to make independent investigations of
complaints for discrimination as well as to impose fines (from 250 to
2500 levs, that is from 125 to 1250 EURO.) to these who violates the
provisions of the law. It will have a right to impose much higher fines
when the case is too serious (up to 20 000 levs or 10 000 EURO). The
commission also will be able to bring lawsuits against these who breach
the provisions of the Law;

- The Body for supervision (i.e. the Commission) when it finds the
provisions of the Law are breached will have a right to issue obligatory
directions for the violators. 

(Human Rights Project will disseminate detailed description of the new
Law when it will be published in State Gazette.) 

The passing of the new law is a final step in a long-term process that
begun fife years ago when the government of Bulgaria approved the
Framework Program for Equal Integration of the Roma into the Bulgarian
Society. As it is well known that document was created by Human Rights
Project during 1998-9. On April 8, 1998 it was signed by more than 70
Roma NGOs and on April 22 the Government of Bulgaria officially approved
it. The first point of the Framework Program was the requirement the
Parliament to adopt Law against the Ethnic Discrimination. Since then we
have continuously insisted on the necessity of such a law. Finally it
was adopted. We understand that the pressure on the part of the European
Union also had too important role for the endorsement of the law. 

The approval of the bill can serve as a model example for teamwork of
the HR NGOs and parts of the Government. The first draft of the bill was
created during the spring of the last year by mixed working group in
which took part lawyers from the Government as well as experts from the
HR NGOs. The whole work on the law was coordinated by the National
Council of Ethnic and Demographic Issues and personally by the Permanent
Secretary of the Council Mr. Michael Ivanov. Here we are obliged to note
also the names of Ms. Diliana Giteva (Chief of the Juridical Department
of human Rights Project), Ms. Margarita Ilieva, who is one of the
leading lawyers of the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee and Ms. Daniela
Mikhailova (Chief of the Juridical Department of Romany Baht Foundation)
who worked with extremely high industry on the draft. The original draft
that was approved by the Council of Ministers in September 2002 was
attacked by group of conservative tuned jurists. Temporarily they could
to stop the moving of the draft. And again the join lobbying by the
group of NGOs activists and the Secretary of the National Council Mr.
Ivanov was what played a key role for the overcoming of the resistance
of the ill-affected jurists. 

The Law will come in force on January the first of next year. Till the
end of March the Commission should be composed. 

Human Rights Project welcomes the endorsement of the new law. We think
that it is the first and too important step in the struggle for final
elimination of the discrimination in our society and especially for the
removal of the discrimination against the Roma. 

We will watch the practical implementation of the Law and also will give
all possible assistance to these Roma who want to bring suits against
these who breach the provisions of the new Act. 

On behalf of HRP:

Emil Cohen 
__________________

*Human Rights Project was established in the summer of 1992 as a
non-profit organization focusing on monitoring the human rights
situation of the Roma in Bulgaria, and on legal defense in cases of
serious human rights abuses. The HRP monitors the human rights situation
of the Roma community in Bulgaria and reports on the cases which it had
investigated; works with Roma volunteers from all over the country who
report on the human rights observation in their region; conduct
independent extrajudicial investigation into allegations of human rights
violations against Roma; hire lawyers to take up selected cases and
monitors the process of legal defense; advocates legislative and policy
changes in favor of Roma.

Rumian Russinov is Chair of the Board of HRP. 

Dimitrina Petrova and Galia Marinova are members of the Board.

Emil Cohen emilcohen@mbox.cit.bg is Executive Director.

Our address: 23 Solunska St., 6th floor; 1000 Sofia, Bulgaria
Tel./fax: (+359 2) 986 35 46 and (+359 2) 981 50 66;
E-mail: hrproject@mbox.cit.bg and hrp@netel.bg