"My main motivation to be here in this square is my desire for justice," Berkay says. The young man was taking part in a protest held last week in Bulgaria's coastal city of Varna, against the arrest of the local mayor.

"My conscience and my sense of civic duty wouldn't allow me just to stand here with my arms folded, in the face of the obvious trend towards authoritarianism in our country," he told DW. Along with other protesters, Berkay didn't want to give his full name.

The protests started after the July 8 arrest of Varna's mayor Blagomir Kotsev, a member of the reformist We Continue the Change, or PP, political party. He was arrested during a raid by Bulgaria's Commission for Anti-Corruption. Kotsev was accused of running a criminal group that extorted companies that received public contracts. Two municipal council members from Kotsev's own party and a businessman from Varna were named as his accomplices in the alleged scheme.

The mayor's arrest also sparked demonstrations in Bulgaria's capital, Sofia, as well as in other places, and has become a symbol for the general public's growing concern about how their current government is using the public prosecutor's office as a weapon.

"Such measures represent a serious interference with democracy and undermine the credibility of the judiciary," another demonstrator, Konstantin, says when DW meets him outside Varna's city hall. "This is not an isolated incident, it's part of a larger problem in the Bulgarian justice system," he argues.

The fact that Bulgaria has some

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