site.btaBulgaria's Delegation for 2025 The Hague NATO Summit Arrives in Netherlands

Bulgaria’s delegation for the 2025 The Hague NATO summit on June 24 and 25 has arrived in the Netherlands, landing at Amsterdam Airport Schiphol.

Led by Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov, the delegation includes Defence Minister Atanas Zapryanov, Chief of Defence Admiral Emil Eftimov, and Foreign Minister Georg Georgiev. On Monday, Georgiev represented Bulgaria at a meeting of the EU Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels.

Bulgaria joined NATO on March 29, 2004. The Alliance also includes Albania, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, the Republic of North Macedonia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, the United States, Turkiye, and Iceland—the latter having no armed forces.

On Tuesday evening at 7 p.m. local time, King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands and Queen Maxima will host a gala dinner for the attending heads of state and government.

The main summit activities will take place on Wednesday, with world leaders scheduled to speak between 10:30 a.m. and 1 p.m. local time. Following the meeting, the 32 NATO member states are expected to issue a joint statement setting a new defense spending target of 5% of GDP—3.5% for core military expenses and 1.5% for investments in areas such as cybersecurity, roads, and hospital infrastructure.