Bulgaria MPs Approve Making Report on Insolvent KTB Public

Lawmakers in Bulgaria have voted to approve on second reading changes to the Bank Insolvency Act paving the way for the publication of a report tracking the assets of insolvent Corporate Commercial Bank (Corpbank or KTB).

Until now the text was only available in Parliament's secret registry, which was not accessible to the general public but only to lawmakers.

Instructions on receivables collection offered in the report will not be disclosed to avoid disruption of the work of receivers.

KTB collapsed following a bank run in June 2014 which pushed the Bulgarian National Bank to place it under supervision.

The publication of the document has been highly controversial among politicians, but has also drawn fire from UK-based consultancy AlixPartners which was tasked with authoring it under clauses of strict confidentiality.

AlixPartners' agreement to lift secrecy was limited only to access by lawmakers, which resulted in Finance Minister Vladislav Goranov sending the report the the secret registry of Parliament where it was available for MPs.

However, legislation changes authored by lawmakers Petar Chobanov, Yordan Tsonev and Delyan Peevski (all from liberal Movements for Rights and Freedoms, or DPS, party) obligate KTB's trustees to upload the report on their website.

Tsonev has reiterated for months that the DPS is committed to a process of "unveiling the whole truth" about KTB.

But his fellow lawmaker Peevski has been linked in a number of media reports to the bank's collapse, which occurred soon after the fallout between Peevski and the bank's majority owner Tsvetan Vasilev with whom the former was said to be involved in a number of joint business ventures.

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