On September 16 2009 the Cabinet approved a set of amendments that will seriously downsize the work of the State Agency for National Security (SANS).

The changes, which are yet to be approved by Parliament, provide for limiting some of SANS' functions and their transfer to the Interior Ministry.

SANS will no longer have the right to perform arrests and use undercover agents in state bodies and security services, these amendments read.

The only arrests SANS will be able to make will be of people who have broken into its premises. However, such detainees will have to be immediately transferred to police custody, amendments say.

That way SANS will function as a solely counter-intelligence service on Bulgarian territory. It will keep its financial intelligence powers, however.

"The changes will improve the efficiency of SANS and Interior Ministry and avoid duplication of functions," Interior Minister Tsvetan Tsvetanov was quoted on the Government's website.

SANS will no longer work on investigations related to organised crimes and European Union funds frauds although SANS expertise could be used on certain cases if needed.

Salaries at SANS, which have been the reason for widespread discontent among Interior Ministry's employees, will not be cut but will be indexed according in line with the country's inflation rate, the same as in all other state bodies.

The amendments also see the restoration of the Chief directorate for fighting organised crime within the Ministry's which was shut down by the previous government when SANS was set up in 2007.

The amendments also introduce new bodies such as municipal police, chief directorate for civil protection, migration directorate, Bulgarian ID documents directorate, international projects directorate and national system 112 hot-line directorate.

Municipal police employees will not come out of the current number of Interior Ministry employees and its salaries will be covered by city halls budgets. They will be controlled by Interior Ministry's regional departments. Municipal police units will feature in the largest municipalities with each mayor judging on his own whether there is need for one.

The two new directorates, national system 112 hot-line directorate and civil protection directorate, will provide services in cases of disaster situations and will manage the 112 emergency hot-line. They will take over some of the functions provided by the now former ministry for emergency situations which was shut down by Prime Minister Boiko Borissov.

The amendments also bring back the post of Interior Ministry chief secretary which was abolished by amendments enacted by the previous ministry leadership earlier this year.