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Minister Zaharieva: Our Presidency achieved the first Council decision on enlargement since 2015

27 June 2018 News

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Ekaterina Zaharieva took part in a discussion on ‘The Bulgarian Presidency of the Council of the EU 2018: the results’, which took place in Sofia.

Speaking to an audience of government ministers, sociologists, political scientists and other experts, Minister Zaharieva outlined some of the more significant foreign policy accomplishments of the Bulgarian Presidency.

‘At the General Affairs Council yesterday, we adopted the first decision on the matter of EU enlargement since 2015,’ said the Minister, stressing that the Bulgarian Presidency must be proud of the consensus achieved between the 28 Member States. It is with such consensus that the EU greenlights the start in 2019 of accession talks with Albania and the Republic of Macedonia. This decision sets a clear timeline and schedule for the negotiations, and clearly defines the commitment of all 28 Member States.

‘I have rarely encountered at a Council meeting the kind of support we received yesterday,’ the Minister disclosed. ‘We can be deservedly proud of the way we convinced our European partners that the security boundaries of Europe do not end at the borders of its Member States but spread beyond those, towards the Western Balkans,’ Zaharieva said.

‘And ultimately, wisdom prevailed,’ said the Minister and explained that the participants in the Council had congratulated Bulgaria on acting not out of self-interest but guided by a desire to work for the common European interests.

‘This Council has taught me that with patience and a clear goal, we can attain common results,’ the Minister added. ‘What we accomplished yesterday can be a sign and a recipe for how we can arrive at common solutions for the migration crisis,’ she went on, stressing that this is the next leading priority on which the EU must achieve a lasting solution.

‘Without a common decision on the migration issue, we cannot expect to have consensus on anything else,’ Zaharieva said. But to arrive at such a decision, it takes common sense and courage on the part of Europe’s political class.

‘I hope for their common sense and their courage. Often we, the traditional political class, are so scared of the wave of populism that surged as a result of the migrant crisis that we respond by mirroring their own moves,’ Zaharieva said. ‘But you cannot respond to populism with even more populism. If we do not wake up from our fears, nothing good will come to us,’ added the Minister and underscored that some of the populist threat, like the macabre economic picture they are painting, are baseless.

‘Unemployment in the EU is back to the levels before the onset of the financial crisis, economic growth is also steady with a positive outlook, se we should not create unnecessary drama with this,’ she said.

Among the achievements of the Bulgarian Presidency that somehow remained out of the spotlight, the Minister noted the common decision, adopted on the previous day, on the future relations with the African, the Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (ACP). ‘We managed to achieve the almost unachievable and to demonstrate that our administration is working,’ she said, adding that this example was part of the common solution on the issue of migration.

The discussion was organized by the Ministry for the Bulgarian Presidency of the Council of the EU. Deputy Prime Minister Tomislav Donchev also delivered a message of greetings.

In her keynote address, the panel moderator Gergana Passy quoted a statement by then Foreign Minister Solomon Passy, dating back to 2005, that Bulgaria would join the EU in 2007, but would become a genuinely full member only after the successful completion of its first Presidency of the Council.

‘We can now congratulate ourselves on having done just that,’ Minister Zaharieva agreed and ended on a message of gratitude to the Bulgarian diplomats. ‘We have excellent diplomats who gave a pleasant surprise to our European partners with the level of ambition of Bulgaria,’ summarized our top diplomat. The participants in the panel, among whom were the political scientists Tatyana Burudzhieva, Daniel Smilov and Dimitar Ganev, described the topic of the European perspective of the Western Balkans as undoubtedly the most successful one for the Bulgarian Presidency.

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