The parliament's legal affairs committee failed to get a quorum for its emergency meeting today. The agenda was the first reading of changes to the State Gazette Act on pardon decrees. Ten MPs were in the room, and 12 were needed for a quorum.

All opposition groups sent members. Progressive Bulgaria sent only the committee chair, Yanka Tyankova. She noted there was no quorum and closed the meeting, saying she had nothing to add. She declined to comment to the media.

The bill was submitted by Asen Vasilev, head of the We Continue the Change group, and a group of MPs. It would require the presidency to publish the pardon decrees it issues. The change also covers all decrees that have not been published so far.

We Continue the Change will collect signatures for another emergency meeting of the committee, Nikolay Denkov said. He said every meeting the ruling party blocks makes it clearer that it wants to hide something, and that there is nothing to fear in the bill.

Petar Petrov of Vazrazhdane, an MP and committee member for five years, said it was the first time in five years that an emergency committee meeting had been boycotted, and by the ruling majority. He hopes it will not happen again.

Nadezhda Yordanova of Democratic Bulgaria thinks the ruling party has learned too quickly to use parliament's rules to avoid votes.

Such changes to the law are needed under a 2012 Constitutional Court ruling, said Stoyu Stoev of the We Continue the Change group. He said the criminal trial and the sentence are public, while a pardon stays out of public view and harms people's public interests. Progressive Bulgaria could have defended its position with legal arguments, he said, and he does not understand why the topic is awkward for them.