2017 | The Execution of Penalties and Detention in Custody Act regulates outdoor stay for not less than an hour a day. In some places the administration allows for extended stay outdoor by an act of the prison director. This creates problems when directors change and the new director reduces the extended stay outdoor. It is appropriate to fix this stay either in the law or Implementing Rules so that this right is regulated in a uniform manner in all closed-type facilities. | Report details |
2019 | Another systemic deficit that the NPM has established through the years is the lack of budget funding for adequate activities carried out by the social workers in their work. In the newly repaired detention facilities there are no spaces for social activities, and where such exist (e.g. the detention facilities in Plovdiv and Shumen) there are no social workers to conduct these activities. | Report details |
2020 | A systemic deficiency the NPM has found over the years is the lack of budget funding for adequate activities in the tasks of social workers. The newly renovated detention centres do not have premises for social activities while the places with such premises (for example, Plovdiv Detention Centre) do not have social workers to perform them. | Report details |
2023 | “Despite the progress made, with the report of the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) of its eighth visit to Bulgaria, published on 18 October 2022, the CPT identifies as pressing and significant the problems of inter-prisoner violence, the inadequate conditions in prisons and detention facilities in the country, the massive spread of bedbugs and cockroaches, and the lack of meaningful and constructive activities for prisoners. The aforementioned findings are corroborated by inspections carried out by the Ombudsman in its capacity . | Report details |