The Venice Commission values its long and important cooperation with Bulgaria's Constitutional Court, its vice-president Eirik Holmøyvik said at a conference in Sofia marking 35 years since the court was set up. See our original report: Constitutional Court hosts delegations from 31 countries in Sofia.
The commission has adopted 30 opinions and reports on Bulgaria, and another is in preparation. Holmøyvik said the commission sees constitutional courts as guardians of the rule of law in the highest degree. For this reason, constitutional justice is a separate item in the commission's Rule of Law Checklist, which was updated in 2025. In Holmøyvik's words, constitutional justice remains a central part of constitutional democracy.
Koen Lenaerts, president of the Court of Justice of the European Union, and Mattias Guyomar, president of the European Court of Human Rights, sent video messages with their greetings.
Lenaerts called the anniversary highly symbolic. He said the creation of the court was one of the events that marked the democratic turn after the fall of the communist regime. Checking laws and other state acts for constitutionality in the early years, he added, helped establish constitutional democracy and paved the way for EU membership on 1 January 2007.
Guyomar named several reasons why national legal systems must adapt to new legal problems: the retreat from democracy, questions of tax and judicial independence, technological progress, and commercial processes that develop faster than regulation. By doing so, he said, they will protect the different principles of the rule of law.
Before the working part of the forum, greetings were given by Alexander Kornezov, a judge at the EU Court of Justice, Mariyana Kancheva, a judge at the EU General Court, and Diana Kovacheva, a judge at the European Court of Human Rights.