site.btaUPDATED President Urges Government to Ensure Full Accession to Schengen by Year's End

President Rumen Radev Friday called on the government to ensure the full accession of Bulgaria to Schengen by the New Year. "The government owes an explanation for harming the national interest and sabotaging our full European integration," he told journalists at Sofia Airport before departure on a visit to Kosovo. 

Radev believes that the ruling majority has lost two months by introducing a higher fee for natural gas transit through Bulgaria. The president also said that he had signed the decree to abolish the contribution for natural gas transit through Bulgaria, which, in his words, brought down a barrier that the government and parliament had erected on the country's path to Schengen.

Radev stressed that the realization of the ridiculous, in his words, policy of the ruling majority, which has decapitalized Bulgarian gas transmission operator Bulgartransgaz and badly positioned Bulgaria as an unreliable partner in Europe, is not the result of self-awareness, but the result of a diplomatic scandal and pressure from Hungary. Radev said the government owed an explanation for harming the national interest.

President also said that he will not veto the 2024 State Budget, which Parliament adopted conclusively on Thursday.

The focus of Radev's visit to Kosovo is the development of bilateral relations, cooperation in areas of mutual interest, Kosovo's European prospects and the Bulgarian community in the country. Regional stability and cooperation in Southeast Europe is also on the agenda.