Which pages are missing in the abbreviated book of Petar Iliev - Bulgaria

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The new version on the left and the original on the right – whole excerpts from chapters have been shortened.

Three and a half parts are missing in the new, abbreviated version of Petar Iliev’s book “The Competence of the National Assembly”, which was agreed in early September and which was submitted to the Ethics Commission and the Dean of the Faculty of Law at Sofia University. Dnevnik found the absence by comparing it the new version, a copy of which is already in the National Library “St. Cyril and Methodius”, with the old one, which is available in several libraries.

In early September, the legal Facebook community “Legal Madness” revealed, that the monograph, which is the subject of plagiarism check in the Ethics Commission of Sofia University, there is already a second version of 618 pages – 80 pages thinner than the original one, published in 2015 by Nova Zvezda, with a volume of 698 pages. Both books cannot be bought anywhere. The website of the publishing house “The Competence of the National Assembly” is exhausted, as 10 days ago only the number of its pages was changed in its presentation.

However, the publisher is already presenting the new version of the only existing one, ignoring the fact that the first version of 2015 is available in libraries in the country and abroad. Judge Vasil Petrov also submitted a copy of the full version to the Ethics Commission. The decision of the commission is expected, but there is no deadline for it.

More confusion instead of more clarity

The 618-page version has so far caused more confusion in the case, because there is no public explanation either by the author Petar Iliev or by the publishing house as to what it is and why it replaces the first edition of 698 pages now.

The investigation began on signals after Petar Iliev was announced as a candidate for “There is such a people”, first as Minister of Justice, then as Prime Minister, and finally as Interior Minister and Deputy Prime Minister for Security. He is a lawyer, doctor and chief assistant in constitutional law at Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”, in his business card it is written that he is an honorary consul of Barbados.

After information came out that in two departments of the Faculty of Law for several years there are known suspicions of illegal copying of foreign scientific work without citation in its legal monograph, Dnevnik did its own inspection. It showed a multi-page match in his book “The Competence of the National Assembly”, published by Nova Zvezda in 2015, with the dissertation of Assoc. Prof. Dr. Natalia Kiselova “Parliamentary Control”, defended in 2008.

What are the differences between the short and long version

Dnevnik compared the contents of the shorter version of the book with that of the original (698 pages).

We have found that several subchapters have been dropped from the first chapter, Parliament and Parliamentarism. These are paragraphs 2, 3 and 4: “Early (dualistic) parliamentarism”, “Classical (monistic) parliamentarism” and “Contemporary (rationalized) parliamentarism” with three sub-paragraphs describing the three waves of “rationalization” of parliamentarism.

The removal of these paragraphs necessitated a renumbering of the content. Thus, paragraph five of the first chapter – “Parliamentary Administration of the Republic of Bulgaria”, has become second and begins on page 46, instead of 107, as in the original edition. This is the largest reduction in the book – 60 pages.

One page has been dropped in the next few chapters. More pages are missing from paragraph 3 of Chapter Three – “Control Powers”. In the more voluminous version of the book, this part is 28 pages long. In the new version it is 11 pages, ie 17 are shortened.

When comparing the contents, the missing parts of the chapters are clearly visible.

The total volume of abbreviations is 78 pages to the bibliography. In the first version, it starts at 657 pages and is 40 pages long. The second one starts at 579 and is 39 pages, that is, there is an abbreviated page from there, although the number of cited sources is the same.

This is the explanation for the missing total of 80 pages. Both editions are the same size, cover, barcode. The shade of blue on the cover differs slightly. The publishing house is denied information about the printing house that printed the publications. Dnevnik asked a random printing house if a 2015 edition printed with them could be compared to today, and received an answer that there may be a discrepancy because the inks are not the same.

Dnevnik repeatedly tried to contact lawyer Iliev, but he hung up. His office said that if he decided, he would contact us. So far this has not happened.

The case is also being investigated by a prosecutor for a crime of a general nature.

According to experts in science plagiarism is considered a serious offense and around the world, those accused of it leave academic positions or the political scene because it creates a false biography and an unrealistic assessment of their abilities.