Minister of Finance: Bulgaria Meets the Last Criterion for the Eurozone, There is Grounds to Request Convergence Report

"Bulgaria has met the last criterion for joining the eurozone – price stability. This was made clear at the beginning of the extraordinary meeting of the Council of Ministers on February 24.

• Eurostat: Inflation in the EU and the euro area rises in January on an annual basis, in Bulgaria it is 3.8%

Finance Minister Temenuzhka Petkova stated that today is a very important day for our country.

"According to these data, Bulgaria has met the last criterion for eurozone membership. This gives us the grounds to make a decision today to send a request to the European Commission and the European Central Bank to prepare extraordinary convergence reports."

Regarding the Eurostat data on the harmonized consumer price index, Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov noted that the price stability criterion is met with Bulgaria's inflation data for January. This is the last important criterion among the three convergence criteria," he noted.