Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ana Dzhumalieva: “Opened dossiers on religious discrimination in the Commission for Protection against Discrimination are not many”

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Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ana Dzhumalieva is a Master in Law. Doctor and Associate Professor in Private International Law. Lecturer at Varna Free University „Chernorizets Hrabar“. Member of the Union of Scientists – Varna branch. Member of the Scientific Council at the Institute of Maritime Law and Logistics at Varna Free University „Chernorizets Hrabar“. She completed a specialized training course in human rights of the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights. She published the monograph “Contract for voyage charters” – 2010 and “Maritime mortgage and privileges over the ship” – 2016. She has more than 60 scientific publications in the field of the international maritime law, human rights and antidiscrimination. Since 2012 she is a Chairwoman of the Commission for Protection against Discrimination.

Mrs. Dzhumalieva, would you please tell us about the circumstances or cases when we could bring a matter to the chaired by you Commission for Protection against Discrimination (CPD)?

Generally discrimination is an attitude towards one who is different as a second-rate person and in this way is offended his dignity and honor, this humiliates him, harasses him.

There are different grounds, protected by the law, in which the discrimination could be available – age, gender, disability, religion, ethnicity, education, color of the skin or other characteristics of individuals. It affects not only the certain victim, but it is dangerous and harmful for the modern society as a whole.

Citizens who have been a target of discriminatory actions at work, in school, on the street, in the municipal authorities, in the health institution, in the store, who feel to be with infringed rights due to inaccessible architectural environment and a number of other practices of discrimination, can bring a complaint or alert to the Commission for Protection against Discrimination.

I could advise the victims of unequal attitude to search help from the Commissions for Protection against Discrimination and in this way to begin consciously to defend their rights. Let they submit a complaint to the Commission, it can be done also through the regional representative, in which they have to describe their complaints. When the charges for unequal treatment are founded and objectively proved CPD has mechanisms through which to restrict such violations of the law.

Would you please outline the separate steps for bringing a case to the Commission for Protection against Discrimination

The arrangements for the conduct of a procedure to the CPD are available in Section I of Chapter IV of the Law on Protection against Discrimination

The initiation of proceedings to the CPD can be done through: complaint, alert or report from a member or members of the Commission, addresses to its full composition. The complaint is an initiative document whose complier and sender can be one affected person or more than one affected persons, where in the latter case it is collective.

The alert can be submitted both from natural or legal persons or public authorities that can be also both state and municipal. In order to use the possibility to begin proceedings at the initiative of the Commission itself is established the approach this to be done by a written report of a member or members of the body to the Chairperson of the Commission.

CPD by law provides independent assistance to the victims of discrimination when complaints for discrimination are submitted. In this context my message to the potential victims of discrimination is to contact the Commission where they can receive adequate advices how to prepare their complaint, what are the rules of procedure, what are the powers of the Commission and the consequences of its final decision.

Are there received complaints in the Commission for Protection against Discrimination from people who have been subject of discrimination on religious basis?

Yes, there are received such complaints, but over the years the opened dossiers on religious discrimination are not many – 51. The cases are different – from prohibition for wearing religious symbols at school, through the absence of prayer places for prisoners professing the relevant religion, preventing from entering a prayer house of representatives of a certain ethnicity who participated in the construction of that house; there are cases where an employer refused to give employment to representative of a certain religious denomination; people professing other religion complain that are subject of hatred speech in the media or are subject to aggression of certain individuals or group of people.

From representatives of which religious communities most often are brought cases for religious discrimination?

Over the years representatives of different religious communities have contacted the Commission with complaints for claimed by them inequalities in treatment – both from professing Orthodoxy or Islam, and also from representatives of the Catholic or of the Protestant churches in the country. 

    Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ana Dzhumalieva and Baki Hyuseinov from the Commission for Protection against Discrimination

What are the tends during the recent years in the alerts for discrimination brought to the Commission?

The total number of complaints, alerts and questions to the CPD in year 2016 is 1192. The number of the decisions is 510 – the highest one over the years since its establishment.

The increasing number of the complaints to the institution undoubtedly witnesses for the development of increased sensibility and for increased civic activity of the Bulgarian society in defending human rights and freedoms of all, as well as intolerance towards the acts of discrimination as well as unequal treatment.

The Commission is often contacted by representatives of vulnerable groups – first of all by disabled people, and these complaints prevail in the opened dossiers; by people belonging to ethnic minorities and others, where all of them are exposed to a direct risk of discrimination.

The analysis of the practice of the CPD over the years confirms the conclusion that the protection against discrimination in exercising the right of employment occupies a significant part of the work of the Commission.

There are complaints for different attitude in the field of healthcare, for differentiated approach in the provision of social services, for discrimination in the field of education, for limiting the access of people to certain goods and services, for inaccessible architectural environment, etc.

Our Law on Protection against Discrimination has a rich set of 19 protected signs, which supposes a greater outreach of the proceedings to the Commission and different in age, gender, education, place in the society applicants who have felt discriminated by some of these signs.

On 14th of March this year the Court of Justice of the European Union in Luxembourg announced its decision with which justifies the prohibition on behalf of employers for wearing Muslim headscarves and religious symbols at work by employees in private companies. How would you comment on this decision of the Court?

This decision of theCourt of Justice of the European Union is announced in order to guarantee the religious neutrality at the workplace. The decisions of the Court of Justice of the European Union are obligatory to be applied in the legal system of our country and we, as equality body, are obliged to comply with them in our practice.

Several days ago the Commission for Protection against Discrimination in partnership with the US Embassy in Bulgaria held a workshop on religious freedom and anti-discrimination in Sofia. What are the similarities and the differences between Bulgaria and the USA with regard to the religious freedom, fighting the religious discrimination, etc? Is there something in which “will we catch up with the Americans?”

Such comparison or parallel is difficult to be done because it concerns different legal systems – Continental to which belongs Bulgaria, and Anglo-Saxon. The non-governmental sector in Bulgaria can draw from the American experience for good practices and efficiency in working with vulnerable groups. The freedom of association, guaranteed by the Constitution, as a concept is exactly the activities of the NGOs that have to be active and through them the society also to be active in the fight against human rights violation. This was highlighted also in the last panel of the workshop by two experts from the USA. 

Workshop of CPD and the US Embassy in “Sofia Hotel Balkan”

                                                                            Photos: CPD Archive

                                                                            Interviewer: L. Chausheva