The Republic of Bulgaria

Ministry of Foreign Affairs

Prior to this post, Valeri R. Ratchev was Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary in the Republic of Iraq, appointed with Decree of the President of the Republic of Bulgaria No 100 of May 2005.

Valeri Ratchev came to that post after 30 years in the Bulgarian army, where he had the following posts:

Deputy Head of the G. S. Rakovski Military Academy and Dean of the National Security and Defence Faculty:
2000-2005
• Deputy Director of the Defence Planning Directorate: 1998-2000
• Deputy Director of the National Security Research Centre: 1994-1998
• Editor-in-Chief of the Military Journal magazine: 1992-1995
• Lecturer at the G. S. Rakovski Military Academy – 1989-1992
• Commander and General Staff officer, Ground Artillery: 1976-1989
• Student at the Higher Military Artillery School in Shumen: 1971-1976.
He obtained his higher education as machine-building engineer and ground artillery officer at the then G. Dimitrov Higher Military Artillery School in Shumen (5 years), and his operational-strategic training – at the Military Academy for Rocket Forces and Artillery in St. Petersburg (3 years).

He specialised strategic research and defence economics at the George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies (Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany/USA – 6 months), crisis management in international relations  at the Institute of International Relations in Rome (3 months) and US foreign policy at the School of Sociology of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, USA (45 days).

He developed his professional expertise in the areas of international and national security, planning and development of defence and of the armed forces, civilian-military relations, crisis management in international relations, defence management, as well as in devising context scenarios for security and defence planning. He has publications on these issues in Bulgarian and foreign editions, he has conducted university courses at the University of Sofia, the New Bulgarian University and the University of National and World Economy, and he has been speaker at numerous professional seminars.

Valeri Ratchev has participated in research projects of nongovernmental organisations in Bulgaria and abroad, as well as in international programmes in support of the governments of Armenia, Indonesia, Moldova, Nepal and Ukraine.

Married with one daughter.