site.btaBulgaria Restarts Relations with Togo, Ethiopia

Lome, May 30 (BTA) - Bulgaria restarts its relations with Togo and Ethiopia and Bulgarian businesses are invited to invest in the region. Тhis emerged after meetings Bulgarian Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ekaterina Zaharieva held with her counterparts of Togo and Ethiopia, Zaharieva's Ministry said Wednesday.

The top Bulgarian diplomat is in Lome for the 107th Session of the Joint Council of Ministers of the European Union and the Africa, Caribbean, and Pacific Group of States (ACP). The forum is attended by delegations of the 28 EU Member States and the 79 ACP countries and was co-chaired by Zaharieva and Namibian Industrialization, Trade, and SME Development Minister Tjekero Tweya.

Zaharieva told her counterparts of Togo and Ethiopia that Bulgaria can offer ample opportunities for joint business in mining, agriculture, hi-tech and robotics, and the pharma industry.

Togo Foreign Minister Robert Dussey proposed that the chambers of industry and commerce of the two countries hold meetings and that a business forum be organized in Lome with Bulgarian companies.

During the decades of command economy in Bulgaria, Bulgarian state-owned companies regularly exported to Togo but relations have been stagnant ever since the collapse of communism in Bulgaria in the 1990s.

Foreign Minister Dussey said that the bilateral agreements date back to the years of communism and need to be updated.

He was also briefed by Zaharieva on the training programmes that Bulgarian universities offer to foreign students.

This has been the first visit by a Bulgarian Foreign Minister to the Togolese Republic since the two countries established diplomatic relations in 1974.

Zaharieva also met with Ethiopian Foreign Minister Workneh Gebeyehu and the two talked about the close ties the two countries had during socialism and how they need to be revived.

Workneh Gebeyehu said that his country can use Bulgaria's know-how in the hi-tech industry and would welcome Bulgarian investment. He also said that Ethiopia has huge consumption and much idle workforce due to the population growth.

Bulgaria and Ethiopia last exchanged political visits at state level in 1991.