“The Bulgarian-Greece border, which is only 30 km away from the Turkey-Greece border, is also threatened by the imigration wave”, commented the Member of the European Union and member of the Bulgarian United National Party and the ruling party of GERB, Emil Radev, during an emergency plenary session of the European Parliament.
He stressed that he supports the technical and financial aid diverted to Greece for handling the imigration crisis. In his statement, he also asked the European Commission to pay more attention to Bulgaria in regards to the challenging situation the country is in.
Radev used the occasion to remind that despite Greece being the hotspot of the crisis, Bulgaria also shares a border with Turkey which has been used on multiple occasions as a transition route by the immigrants on their way to Western countries. According to his statement, over 35,000 people are at the threshold of Europe. A large part of them are children separated from their parents.
He commented that he hoped Turkey would remain a loyal partner and would not break its agreement with the European Union. He also pointed out that this is the perfect moment for a new immigration policy to be forged in order to more adequately correspond to the current immigration reality.
A couple of days ago, Radev addressed the European Commission in a letter, asking whether there is any financial, expert or technical aid, as well as humanitarian aid, planned for Bulgaria which is an external border of the European Union.
The emergency plenary session took place in the Belgian capital of Brussels and had to be brief due to the precautionary measures for prevention of COVID-19 spreading. Only the most urgent topics were discussed during the session.
Translation: Ivaylo Yotov
