site.btaUPDATED Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria Top MEP Candidates Meet with Bulgarians in Brussels

Nikola Minchev and Daniel Lorer, who top the list of Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria (CC-DB) for the June 9 European elections, Thursday met with representatives of the Bulgarian community in Brussels. Former prime minister Nikolay Denkov also addressed those gathered.

Minchev said: "To us, EU membership is one of the biggest achievements in Bulgaria's recent history. Even forcible Sovietization failed to change the European gene of Bulgarian patriotism." In his words, CC-DB will strive for Bulgaria to be "at the core of the EU".

For his part, Nikolay Denkov noted that the most important thing is not the past, but what can be done about the future. He said there are concrete plans for ending checks on Bulgaria's Schengen land borders after Austria's legislative election later this year, "as long as there is no negative impact of internal instability" in Bulgaria. In his words, unless something goes wrong and unless a high-deficit budget is proposed, Bulgaria will soon see a positive development regarding its Eurozone accession.

The main message is that Bulgaria is, and will be, in Europe, Denkov told Bulgarian journalists before the start of the meeting. "Every day we have to fight for Bulgaria's future - to make sure that it is pro-European, that a dictatorship will not emerge and that the country will not be subordinated to a foreign power again - we see such desires and attempts. We are confident that Bulgaria's future should be decided by the Bulgarians - in Bulgaria and abroad," he added.