site.btaPresident Radev: Three Seas Initiative Strengthens Its Position as Instrument for Economic Growth, Social Cohesion

March 9 (BTA) - Meeting here on Tuesday with Tsvetan
Kyulanov, acting head of the European Commission's
Representation in Bulgaria, President Rumen Radev said that the
Three Seas Initiative is strengthening its position as a
valuable instrument for achieving economic growth and
accelerated social and economic cohesion between Eastern and
Western Europe. He also said, as quoted by his Press
Secretariat, that the regional initiative contributes to
overcoming the existing infrastructural differences and to the
integration of the twelve EU countries in the region with
Western Europe, which makes the whole EU stronger.

The head of State said that during its chairmanship of the Three
 Seas Initiative this year, Bulgaria will continue to work
towards the synchronization of the Initiative's projects with
the EU's policies.

Kyulanov noted the progress made in the development of the Three
 Seas Initiative Investment Fund and the cooperation
opportunities, such as the synchronization of projects within
the Initiative with the priorities set in the EU's Recovery and
Resilience Facility.

The European Commission is a strategic partner of the Three Seas
 Initiative together with the US and Germany.

Earlier on Tuesday, the Foreign Ministry reported that Deputy
Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ekaterina Zaharieva and
Beata Daszynska-Muzyczka, Chairperson of the Supervisory Board
of the Three Seas Initiative Investment Fund, have agreed that
Bulgaria and Poland will work together to attract more
investments in the region within the Three Seas Initiative.
Daszynska-Muzyczka, who is also Management Board President of
Poland's Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego (BGK), is paying a visit
here at the invitation of the Bulgarian Development Bank.
  
Zaharieva, who is national coordinator of the Three Seas
Initiative chaired by Bulgaria this year, said that investments
in the energy sector are of great importance for countries like
Bulgaria. She put an emphasis on the project to expand the
Chiren underground gas storage facility as a key project for the
 whole region and one of the four projects Bulgaria proposes to
be implemented within the Initiative.

Zaharieva and her guest also discussed: the need for the
investment policy of the Three Seas Initiative Investment Fund 
and the funding under EU cohesion instruments and programmes to
complement each other; the opportunities for European Investment
  Bank funding; and the attraction of private investments from
the US, Germany, the UK and Japan.

Zaharieva said she expects the Bulgarian Development Bank and 
BGK to work together towards the implementation of the Three 
Seas Initiative's goals and the organization of the Sofia
Business Forum within the Initiative this year. RI/DS


/МЙ/