site.bta Defence Minister: Bulgaria Will Continue to Defend Its Air Space

Defence Minister: Bulgaria Will Continue to Defend Its Air Space 

Sofia, May 4 (BTA) - Defence Minister Nikolay Nenchev and Chief
of Defence Vice Admiral Roumen Nikolov held a videoconference
with the Bulgarian military contingents in Afghanistan, Bosnia
and Herzegovina, Kosovo and Mali on Monday in connection with
the Day of Valour and the Day of the Bulgarian Armed Forces
marked on May 6.

Nenchev said: "We will continue defending Bulgarian air space.
There is no cause for concern at this point, we have several MiG
 aircraft which perform their duties. The repairs of several of
them would cost over 80 million leva." Another option would be
to spend about 24 million leva and repair two of them this year
to make sure they will continue to perform their duties by the
end of 2016, he said.

Asked about the maintenance of MiG-29 fighters and other
Russian-made equipment used in Bulgaria, Nenchev commented that
this country is probably the only NATO member which is almost
fully dependent on Russia. "We will try to reduce dependence on
Russia and other non-NATO countries as much as possible," the
Defence Minister said.

The programme for development of the armed forces' defence
capabilities has been introduced into the Council of Ministers,
Nenchev said. It will be discussed and possibly adopted and will
 then be tabled in Parliament. He confirmed that the proposed
allocation for modernization is about 4 billion leva.

Asked about the Bulgarian involvement in Afghanistan, the Chief
of Defence said the operation there was scheduled to continue
until the year's end.