Criminal justice

The defense of Miroslav Miskovic has requested that their client be given back the EUR 12 in bail money that he paid to be released from custody.

This has been reported by N1 broadcaster, who said the motion was submitted after the Constitutional Court ruled that the decision on detaining Miskovic was unconstitutional.

The Sofia City Court on Friday handed a one-year suspended sentence to Vladimira Yaneva, the court's former chair.

Germany will make it easier to deport criminal foreigners following public outrage over the New Year's Eve assaults in Cologne, officials said on Jan. 12.

"With this proposal we are significantly lowering the hurdles for the possible expulsion of foreigners who have committed crimes in Germany," Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere told reporters in Berlin.

A Greek prison in Trikala, northwestern Thessaly, has been locked down after the discovery of a tunnel that could be used in an escape plot. The tunnel was found by prison guards who searched the cell of an inmate. A full investigation is now underway.

An indictment of the investigation into negligence of public officials in the killing of prominent Armenian-Turkish journalistHrant Dink in Istanbul has been approved by the court.

The number of child inmates in Turkey's prisons increased by five times between 2010 and 2014, according to newly released data from the Turkish Statistics Institute (TÜ?K).

A total of 26 former police officers may face trial as the indictment in the nine-year-long investigation into negligence by public officials in the assassination of prominent Armenian-Turkish journalistHrant Dink has been approved by an Istanbul prosecutor's office, daily Hürriyet has reported.

The number of convicts in Turkey's prisons rose by more than 10 percent from 2013 to 2014, according to data recently released by the Turkish Statistics Institute (TÜ?K).

The number of individuals in prison increased yearly by 10.1 percent in 2014, as the population in Turkish prisons was around 144,000 in 2013 and 158,690 in 2014, according to data released by the TÜ?K on Dec. 7.

Sofia City Court (SGS) acquitted the former deputy speaker of the Bulgarian parliament, Hristo Biserov, of all three charges brought against him on Tuesday.

Biserov was charged with tax evasion, undeclared currency deals and undeclared bank accounts held in Switzerland, but was found innocent.

With Paris being attacked by terrorists, US issuing a travel alert and Brussels being under a security lockdown amid a manhunt for one of the suspected attackers responsible for the Paris attacks, many people might choose to stay home rather than travelling.