NEWS

“For Bulgaria Romania is a good neighbor, partner and ally. The two countries intend to adopt a common approach to the key issues on the Southeast-European and EU agenda.” This is what President Rosen Plevneliev said at a joint news conference given together with his Romanian counterpart Klaus Iohannis in Bucharest.

 

President Plevneliev is the first Head of State who is paying an official visit to Romania after President Iohannis took office. Rosen Plevneliev emphasized that the two countries have the ambition to achieve concrete results regarding energy diversification and enhancing the security of the natural gas supplies. 

 

“Southeast Europe needs a regional natural gas market and a regional energy bourse, which will liberalize the energy market and will provide the countries in the region the opportunity to offer supplies at competitive prices,” the Bulgarian Head of State said. In the President’s words, Bulgaria and Romania have reached an agreement on promptly completing the construction of a bidirectional gas connection between the two countries as part of the construction of the South-North energy corridor. “This will connect Bulgaria’s gas-transit network with Greece and Romania and will allow the transit of natural gas from Azerbaijan, Qatar to Central Europe in the future, Rosen Plevneliev said. The President added that with the help of EU funding, the interconnector between Bulgaria and Greece is due to be completed in 2017.  

 

“Romania produces a lot of electricity and is interested in connecting its gas-transit network with that of Bulgaria, so that it can export electricity for the countries in the region,” President Iohannis said.  

Rosen Plevneliev and Klaus Iohannis emphasized that the accession to Schengen is a priority both for Bulgaria and Romania and the European Commission and European Parliament have more than once acknowledged that the two countries have met the technical criteria. The EU rules should be valid for all and all EU partners should recognize what Bulgaria and Romania have achieved, was the common position shared by the two presidents.  “We cannot agree that this issue should be related to the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism and we cannot wait endlessly,” Rosen Plevneliev and Klaus Iohannis were adamant.  

At the joint news conference with his Romanian counterpart, the Bulgarian President emphasized our country’s interest in further strengthening the economic cooperation with Romania, which is Bulgaria’s third largest trading partner within the EU. The trade between Bulgaria and Romania has increased eight times in the period 2003-2010 and in 2013 it reached 3,5 billion euros. The Head of State emphasized that the countries in the region should work so as to ensure more connectivity by implementing infrastructure projects, including new bridges over the Danube river, building a joint hydro-electric station, strengthening the partnership between the Danube municipalities under the Danube strategy and the Bulgaria-Romania Cross Border Cooperation Program. 

 

President Plevneliev further highlighted the interest of the Romanian tourists in the Bulgarian resorts. Almost one million Romanian tourists visit Bulgaria per year. At the same time Romania is a preferred tourist destination for Bulgarians and 300,000 Bulgarians visit our north neighbor per year.

In reply to a journalist’s question concerning the success Romania has achieved in its fight against corruption, President Plevneliev commented that the Bulgarian judicial institutions are also sending “positive signals” with the actions they have taken, including the removal of top-level magistrates from their posts. “The important thing is that the Bulgarian parliament approved by a vast majority the Updated strategy on continuing the reform in the judiciary. Not only the work of the judicial system should be efficient, but also political will and courage is needed to meet the public expectations,” the Head of State further said. 

 

The two presidents also discussed the prospects for strengthening the cooperation between Bulgaria and Romania in the defense sector, as well as conducting more joint military exercise of the two countries’ armed forces. They shared the opinion that the crisis in Ukraine changes the security environment in the region and requires a more active cooperation between the NATO member states in Southeast Europe and the Black Sea region.  

 

The two countries are working on educational projects in order to meet the needs of the Bulgarian national minority in Romania and the Romanian community in Bulgaria, it further became clear at the talks held between the two presidents.  Bulgaria will continue helping the Banat Bulgarians in their efforts to preserve their language and cultural identity, the Head of State emphasized. 

 

Within his visit, President Rosen Plevneliev will also hold meetings with Victor Ponta, prime-minister of Romania, with Calin Popescu-Tariceanu, president of the Senate of Romania, and with Florin Yordake, deputy-president of the Chamber of deputies. The Head of State will also meet representatives of the Romanian business circles and the Bulgarian community in Bucharest. 

 

At the meeting it also became clear that in the first half of 2015 a joint meeting of Bulgaria’s and Romania’s governments will be held.

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