The ambition of Boiko Borissov’s new Bulgarian government is for the country to become more relevant and more visible within the European Union, foreign minister-designate Roumyana Zheleva said in an interview with Bulgarian National Radio.
 
She saw Bulgaria’s EU membership as an opportunity not just for access to financial instruments but also to a system of values.
 
Bulgaria joined the bloc at the start of January 2007 but has encountered trouble in its relationship with the Union, including the blocking of pre-accession funds because of inadequacies in administration.
 
Zheleva said that it was important to be fully aware of Bulgaria’s commitments to the EU, because the country had entered the bloc voluntarily.
 
A successful relationship with the EU meant learning to read between the lines, Zheleva told Bulgarian National Radio’s Nedelya 150 talk show.
 
Bulgaria needed to act pre-emptively and to have foresight in its communications with EU headquarters in Brussels, she said.
 
She believed that the EU saw its relationship with Bulgaria as a genuine partnership and it was not a union in which one necessarily wanted to punish the other.
 
Zheleva said that all ministries responsible for the implementation of operational programmes would be encouraged to interact more intensively with Brussels.
 
The goal is for them to really protect their operational programmes, and the proposed implementation of these projects, Zheleva said.