So far Bulgaria had received a total of 1.086 billion leva from the EU and had paid 595 million leva, Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev told Parliament.

The balance was that Bulgaria had recieved 491 million leva more than it had paid, Stanishev said as quoted in a Council of Ministers media statement.

Bulgaria had received more than 283 million leva of payments in advance under EU structural and cohesion funds. The country received more than 263 million leva for support to budget payments and for strengthening the Schengen borders. Nearly 540 million leva had been granted to Bulgaria under the Phare, ISPA and SAPARD programmes.

Stanishev said that the country was currently negotiating the conditions of a financial agreement with the European Investment Fund under the JEREMIE financial instrument.

Revision and preparation of preliminary studies for the construction of the Struma highway, widening of the part of the international road E-85 between Rousse and Veliko Turnovo and improvements of the Danube River navigation system were among projects to be funded by the JASPERS instrument.

Stanishev denied statements that Bulgaria delayed its preparation for effective utilisation of the EU funds. The sums that each EU member has utilised would become clear at the end of the period for which they had been granted, not every year, Stanishev said. Bulgaria was one of the first EU member states with a National Strategic Reference Framework and operational programmes approved by the EC.

Bulgaria’s Council of Ministers took a number of measures for the effective utilisation of EU finds, the PM said. “An information campaign that is unprecedented in its scale” to reach possible beneficiaries in various regions was held. Still, a second information campaign on the programmes and the project preparations was to be held.