Outgoing PM: Extended Budget Will Not Affect Bulgaria’s Eurozone Entry

Resigned Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov announced that he had no worries about Bulgaria's accession to the euro area because the country would adopt the euro with an extended budget. Zhelyazkov said this in Brussels ahead of the EU-Western Balkans summit. Tomorrow, the outgoing prime minister will take part in the summit of community leaders, where a decision on a loan for Ukraine is to be taken. Zhelyazkov said that our country would support the decision on the loan.

Rosen Zhelyazkov - outgoing Prime Minister: ' I have no idea. The government at the moment when it adopted at a meeting of the Council of Ministers a law on collecting revenues and making expenditures, the so-called extension budget, very clearly showed that it has no political commitment to implement policies for which there is no support in the parliament for 2026. It is now obvious that we are going to elections, all the political parties are saying that, so my view is that as soon as possible there should be a new, stable regular government to be able to pass a budget that will guarantee all the policies that a government that has received the legitimacy from the sovereign can carry out."

photo: BGNES

Rosen Zhelyazkov - outgoing prime minister: " Financial guarantees are not yet talked about in the regulation or talked about with the necessary procedures for this. But this is not an issue that we are currently going to discuss. We are discussing political decisions. As you know, this was divided into two phases - the first phase was the permanent asset freeze, we supported it. The second phase will be the regulation of the so-called reparation loan, where we, once our considerations have been heard, and I believe they have been heard, will have a common European position."