Since early September 2003, the Association for European Integration and Human Rights has been implementing a project for civil control over the acts and actions of the administration. This project has been funded by the Democracy Commission at the Embassy of the United States in Sofia .
The project specifically focuses on the submission of appeals to the Supreme Administrative Court against unlawful sub-delegated normative acts issued by the various levels of the administration in Bulgaria .

A project for conducting strategic cases in the public interest and providing free legal aid to socially vulnerable community members.

Project for legal defense of people with disabilities (2001-2003), funded by Open Society Foundation – Sofia.

The project's main human rights priority was to protect the rights of people with permanent physical disabilities. This was achieved through the initiation of legal proceedings against the State, and more specifically against the Minister of Regional Development and Public Works and the municipalities that bear the responsibility to provide easily accessible architectural and urban environment.

The legal grounds on which the State was held accountable were the provisions of Article 27 and Article 28 of the Protection, Rehabilitation and Social Inclusion of the Disabled Act (promulgated in State Gazette No. 112/27.12.1995) and the Rules on the Application of the same Act (promulgated in State Gazette No. 97/12.11.1996). Enforcing the above, the State, in the person of the Ministry of Regional Development and Public Works, the Ministry of Transport as well as the municipalities, had assumed the imperative obligation to provide urban and architectural environment that was easily accessible to people with disabilities.

Despite this, the responsible institutions have been neglecting their legal obligations completely. They have not taken the necessary measures to remove the existing architectural obstacles and reconstruct the existing buildings and communication facilities. Furthermore, a number of new large-scale construction projects and reconstruction work which do not comply with the needs of the disabled and the provisions of the law are being carried out.

The planned 20 legal proceedings were initiated in Bulgaria's biggest cities – Sofia, Plovdiv and Stara Zagora – as the architectural environment there is most ‘severe' to the people with disabilities.

The legal actions were brought by four lawyers representing nongovernmental human rights organizations:

• In Sofia: lawyer Kamen Kostakiev, who works for the Center for Independent Life – a nongovernmental organization of people with disabilities;
• in Plovdiv: lawyer Mihail Ekimdjiev, founder and representative of Association for European Integration and Human Rights, and lawyer Snezhana Stefanova;
• In Stara Zagora: lawyer Iskren Pachamanov.

The concentration of the legal proceedings in two of Bulgaria 's biggest cities and especially in the capital ensured good media publicity. It was not a coincidence that the beginning of the lawsuits was covered by all national mass media, including lengthy reports on bTV and Channel 1 of the National Television. The efficacy of this approach was proved by the fact that during the stage of preparation for the legal proceedings, which was also covered by the media, the Regulation of the Capital's Municipal Council on the Construction of Easily Accessible Environment in the City of Sofia was adopted on 9 October 2001.

Another fact of importance was that the cases were conducted by lawyers with extensive professional experience who were organizationally connected with the human rights organizations directly involved in the project implementation.

Project for protection of the fundamental human rights and freedoms by conducting cases in the public interest and providing free legal aid (1 August 2001 – 1 November 2002), funded by Open Society Foundation – Sofia.

This project combined two interrelated forms of exercising law in the interest of the public by providing free legal aid:

• Providing free legal consultations;
• Conducting cases of considerable public resonance.

Due to the different human rights focus, the implementation of these two interrelated structural ‘modules' should be described separately.

1. Conducting cases in the public interest

In addition to their tangible human rights effects, these cases also have a considerable public resonance which is objectified in legislative changes, precedents in the practice of the judicature and administrative bodies and changes in the psychological attitudes towards human rights as a fundamental value of democratic society. What is most effective as a legal instrument to achieve the socially significant effects outlined above is the conduct of cases against the state.

Depending on the type of the utilized procedure for human rights protection and the body before which this procedure takes place, the cases conducted ‘in the interest of the public' can be classified as ‘domestic cases' and cases brought before the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

In terms of the human-rights related goals of the project, these two categories have specific characteristics.

1.A. Strategically, the most effective cases are the ones brought before the European Court of Human Rights, whose judgments not infrequently highlight the discrepancies between domestic law and practices and the requirements of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and thus contribute to bridging the gap between them. These judgments have the most tangible public resonance as well. Emblematic examples in this respect are the judgments in the cases of Assenov v. Bulgaria and Nikolova v. Bulgaria which provoked and accelerated the radical reform in the Code of Criminal Procedure.

Unfortunately, the work of the European Court of Human Rights has been slowed down increasingly, mostly due to the enormous workload of East-European cases. Applications are usually dealt with in a period of 4 to 6 years. On the other hand, applications can be submitted to the Court in Strasbourg only when all effective domestic remedies to redress an alleged violation have been exhausted, the latter often taking years on end.

This is the reason why the applications submitted to the European Court of Human Rights are insufficient as a means to achieve the human rights priorities of the project, although they have proved to be effective.

1.B. The second component of the conduct of cases in the interest of the public involves the actions against state bodies and institutions brought before domestic law courts under the State Responsibility for Damages Inflicted on Citizens Act. Bringing these actions before Bulgarian judges is conducive (in the long term, though) to the formation of appropriate professional attitudes towards the human rights issues arising from unlawful acts, actions or inaction of representatives of the state authorities. These cases contribute to the establishment of effective domestic administration of justice in the field of human rights, which constitutes a major responsibility of the state ensuing from the provision of Article 13 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.

1.C. It was in the course of implementation of this project that another interesting category of cases emerged for the first time. These were the cases against national monopolists, such as the National Electricity Company, the Central Heating Company and the Water Supply and Sewerage Company, as well as the appeals lodged with the Supreme Administrative Court aiming to rescind the provisions of some sub-delegated normative acts that contravene the laws and the Constitution of the Republic of Bulgaria .

In Bulgaria , where no anti-monopolist practice in the administration of justice has been established, the actions brought by community members against the arbitrarily charged prices of electricity, telephones, water and heating represent a legal remedy against the abuse of monopoly, which, unfortunately, is still being tolerated by the authorities. In this respect, the first cases against the National Electricity Company and the Central Heating Company have been won by the legal experts of the Association for European Integration and Human Rights.

The cases aiming to rescind the provisions of sub-delegated normative acts that contravene legal norms of a higher juridical rank are becoming increasingly effective as a domestic remedy reinforcing the priority of the principle of legality over expediency, which is a characteristic of the constitutional state.

On the basis of an appeal submitted by the Association for European Integration and Human Rights, the Supreme Administrative Court (five-member judicial chamber) rescinded by Decision No. 798/13.02.2001 Item 24 of Tariff No. 1 of the Regulation on the State Dues Charged by the Judicial Bodies, whereby citizens had been obliged to pay state dues to exercise their constitutional right of legal counsel.

So far, the Association has lodged appeals with the Plovdiv Regional Court for rescission of two regulations of the Plovdiv Municipal Council. These regulations contravene some provisions of a higher juridical rank and lead to the establishment of local rules and practices that violate some of the fundamental rights and freedoms and contravene the fundamental principles of law.

The analysis of the number and type of cases initiated in the course of project implementation yields the following results:

• In the period 1 August 2000 - 1 November 2001, a total of 74 cases were initiated, whereas 70 cases had been originally planned for the entire one-year project duration. These cases were initiated before domestic and international institutions by 13 legal experts from the Association for European Integration and Human Rights who work in Plovdiv , Pazardjik and Lovech.
• In comparison, 53 cases were funded and eight lawyers initiated them in the course of implementation of a similar project entitled ‘Beginning' (1999-2000).

The main trend that can be singled out in the analysis of project implementation may be summarized in the following manner: There has been an increase not only in the number but also in the scope of human-rights related activity. An ever-increasing number of lawyers initiate a greater number and variety of cases which are brought under various procedures before various domestic and international institutions involved in human rights protection.

In practice, this means that an increasing number of human rights problems, which seemed to be insolvable by means of conventional legal remedies until quite recently, can be legally solved through unconventional procedural approaches, owing to the opportunity to experiment with law in the interest of the public, as given by the project in question.

2. Providing free legal aid to the clients in the form of legal consultations.

Following the conduct of cases in the interest of the public, this is the second most important human-rights related activity of the project.

In accordance with the established practice, every Tuesday and Thursday between 17:30 and 19:30 the Association's experts provide free legal consultations in all areas of law. These consultations take place in the reception bureau of the Association. So far, more than 300 people have been provided with free legal consultations. This number alone is a sufficiently eloquent fact revealing people's increasing trust in the work of the Association as an institution involved in human rights protection as well as the immediate human rights impact of its activity. At the reception bureau of the Legal Agency of Human Rights in Pazardjik, 49 people have been provided with consultations.

Over the last two years, the project for conducting cases in the interest of the public has been implemented parallel to the project for self-training and professional development of practising lawyers , with a special emphasis on the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.

The outcomes of the two projects may be described as follows:

In general, what has proved to be most productive is the effect of combining the theoretical approach adopted in the ‘educational' project with the empirical knowledge acquired in the process of providing free legal aid. Though it was not deliberately sought, the result was an effect of ‘dialectic transition' from the theoretical to the practical activity of human rights protection and vice versa.

During the implementation of the two projects, there was an observable process of formation of a new type of non-conformist professional thinking and behaviour, a new type of attitude of the lawyer towards his/her client and his/her rights, on the one hand, and towards state institutions, on the other hand. On the basis of the knowledge acquired and professional confidence gained in this process, an increasing number of lawyers tend to experiment while exercising law in the interest of the public. Both professionally and deontologically, this trend serves as the natural counterpoint to the conformist behaviour which is traditional for Bulgaria, characteristic of quite a few lawyers and stimulates the existing attitudes and expectations of corruption.

In view of the above, it follows that the outcomes of the implemented project comply with the goals set out in the project proposal.

Project for training of journalists in the field of human rights (2001-2003), funded by Open Society Foundation – Sofia .