site.btaDefence Minister Tagarev Comments on Purchase of New Armoured Vehicles

Defence Minister Todor Tagarev expressed hope in a bTV interview that the project for new armored vehicles will pass in Parliament soon, as it is very important that the contract is concluded and operational this year. He recalled that payments for new armored vehicles for the Land Forces, worth a total of USD 1.376 billion, VAT excluded, were envisaged both in this year's budget and in the estimated macro framework for the next three years.

"If we wait for MPs to come back after the elections and then start the discussions in the plenary hall, there is a risk that we will not succeed with the procedures, because there has to be a signing of a treaty and it has to come back for ratification as an intergovernmental treaty, which will take time" Tagarev explained. 

This week, the project received support from both the Parliamentary Defence Committee and the Budget and Finance Committee. The discussions in the plenary hall are coming up, where a final decision on the matter has to be taken.

On the occasion of the decision of the National Assembly to give malfunctioning S-300 missiles to Ukraine, the Minister stressed again that this would not affect the state of the Bulgarian armed forces. The number of missiles depends on the conclusion of an inspection, which is carried out every year and establishes the condition of all the armaments and equipment of the Army, Tagarev said.

The Defence Minister also commented that there are no grounds for the vote of no confidence in the Denkov-Gabriel cabinet requested on Thursday. This is an election campaign situation in which opposition parties are trying to extract some dividends, Tagarev said. He added that it is not possible to stop the projects under the Recovery and Resilience Plan, as this country expects billions for them, and defined the miners' and energy workers' protests as political.