Ex-minister brings criminal libel case over unemployment benefit fraud story

Reporters Without Borders calls on the Bulgarian judicial authorities to immediately abandon an investigation into a politically motivated criminal libel complaint by a former government minister over a 2013 newspaper report that he fraudulently claimed unemployment benefit in France in 2004 and 2005. Journalist Atanas Chobanov was stunned to learn few days ago that he is the target of a complaint brought by former planning and investment minister Ivan Danov. He has already been questioned once by the police as a result of the investigation that the prosecutor’s office quietly opened on 26 June. According to an article that Chobanov wrote for the investigative news website Bivol.bg in June 2013, Danov was collecting 1,800 euros a month in unemployment benefit in France while holding down two jobs in Bulgaria. The story aroused the interest of the French newsweekly L’Express, which dedicated a series of articles to the case. When the French TV channel M6 dedicated one of its “Zone Interdite” broadcasts to the story in November 2014, the Bulgaria media picked it up and gave it a great deal of coverage. “This criminal libel prosecution is manifestly designed to intimidate,” Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Christophe Deloire said. “It is clearly a political case, one brought by a man taking advantage of his status as a former government minister." “It is perfectly legitimate for a journalist to inform the public about known cases of fraud by politicians. We call on the Bulgarian judicial authorities to close this investigation and to abandon the proceedings against Atanas Chobanov.” Bulgaria is ranked 106th out of 180 countries in the 2015 Reporters Without Borders press freedom. This is the worst ranking of any European Union member.