site.btaUPDATED PM Denkov: Bulgaria and Romania Not Considering Schengen Alternative

Prime Minister Nikolay Denkov stressed Friday that Bulgaria and Romania are not considering an alternative to Schengen. He said in Bucharest that Bulgaria’s accession to the Schengen area in October is a realistic goal. Denkov gave a press conference for the Bulgarian media in the Romanian capital, immediately after his official meeting with Romanian Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu.

“We are discussing how best to fulfil both the internal and the external political tasks so we can convince others that we should be part of Schengen,” he explained in response to a question by BTA whether it is possible to create a “mini-Schengen” and to abolish border controls between two countries.

"The only problem is that not everything depends on our two countries,” Denkov pointed out. He noted that the governments of Bulgaria and Romania are managing to meet all the different requirements for the accession – whether that are connected to legislation or border security. “We are doing that to make sure that any criticism [towards us] from now on will be unfounded,” he stated.

The Prime Minister underlined that from now on Bulgaria must convince the parliaments of the Netherlands and Austria that it is ready to enter Schengen. “We need to be able to implement an effective communication campaign to convince the other two countries, which currently have some reservations, that it would be useful for them if we are part of Schengen. This is a slightly more difficult but possible task,” Denkov concluded.

In response to a question, he added that the fact that Bulgaria has caught migrants is not an argument against the country. "We are showing that we are actually fighting systematically to prevent migrants from transiting through Bulgaria and going to Austria. After all, the Austrian parliament is interested in how many migrants have applied for asylum," Denkov explained. 

He argued that Bulgaria should work very carefully with both Austria and the Netherlands. "I would not like to separate the two countries. What the Netherlands has always put as a focus is to implement the legislative programme that is currently discussed in the National Assembly, while Austria is much more interested in what is happening at the border, if migrants manage to get through, passing to their territory. These two tasks are complementary to each other, so we are working on both of them," the Prime Minister pointed out.

He informed the journalists that a new approach is being worked on, in which Romania is the main but not the only partner and which aims to hit precisely the networks of organized crime that carry out the smuggling of migrants. "These are the people who are paid to organize the transport," Denkov explained and added that some of the raids are discussed, planned and based on information from other countries. The government is working together with Europol, FRONTEX and with several countries, such as Romania, which are on the eastern border. Cooperation with Moldova is also planned. "We are discussing extending this cooperation to Turkiye, but that process has not started yet. The idea is to push these group organizers, to break the channels," Denkov stated.

Denkov also touched upon the issue of the new military aid to Ukraine in the form of 100 armoured personnel carriers. He explained that the machines are not from the Bulgarian army contingent, but were bought in the 1980s and are in the warehouses of the Interior Ministry. 

"They have never been used, even exercises have never been done with them. They are just sitting in warehouses. From this point of view they are a burden for the Ministry and for Bulgaria as a whole. Talks about them took place during President Zelensky's visit. We asked them [the Ukrainian delegation] if they would be useful, they said yes, so we are preparing them to be sent there," Denkov said.

Responding to a BTA question whether specific deadlines were discussed in connection with the Ruse-Giurgiu ferry line at Friday’s meeting with the Romanian delegation in Bucharest, the Bulgarian Prime Minister said that the process was being delayed but the issue had been raised several times in the course of the negotiations. "We made clear that this is a high priority for us and we hope for a quick solution," Denkov stressed. 

He also said that Sofia and Bucharest had agreed to try to jointly submit documents on a possible European project to finance a second bridge at Ruse-Giurgiu as soon as possible. 

"We will look for other opportunities. But I would say that for the first time in a long time we have a very clear, firm position from Romania that it wants to work on the bridge in the short term," Nikolay Denkov said.