TOP Bulgarian officials have issued a series of reassurances about the country's process of accession to the European Union.
Soon after referendums in France and the Netherlands produced "no" votes against the EU constitution - a move followed by assurances that this would not affect the process of accession because this is governed by the accession treaty and not the constitution - it was reported that the European Commission was sending Bulgaria warning letters about shortcomings in meeting its accession commitments.
Foreign Minister Solomon Passi and European Affairs Minister Meglena Kuneva said that the warning letter was a standard procedure.
"The early warning letters we expect to receive from enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn should not be over-dramatised," Passi said. "We have long known about them and have worked well with the Commission. These letters come as no surprise to me."
According to Passi, such early warning letters are standard procedure applied to all accession countries in the period between the signing of an accession treaty and actual accession.
"Clearly, Bulgaria will encounter increasing difficulties in its progress to EU membership and, what is more, it is impossible to extemporize during the accession process," Passi said.
He said that any calls to reopen negotiating chapters and suggestions of other types of "revolutionary" conduct could backfire.
"Rehn's letters should be taken as a very clear warning that Bulgaria should by no means steer away from its chosen path and that it should keep up the pace of the past four years," he said.
"Warnings from the EU will continue to come until the end of 2006, but I would like to warn everybody who plans to make statements about reopening of chapters that the Austrian Presidency in the first half of 2006 will probably be the most important EU Presidency for Bulgaria, and Austria is a country that is absolutely opposed to the very existence of a nuclear power industry," Kuneva said. "I attribute this to the ignorance of certain politicians who built their entire election campaign on conduct that is rather prejudicial for Bulgaria's European future."
"I have repeated time and again the spheres which might attract criticism: justice and home affairs, agriculture, services and especially the environment, which is regulated by numerous directives," she said.
Meanwhile, Standart daily published an article on criticisms contained in the letters, of which it said it had copies.
According to Standart, the EC had said that Bulgaria was lagging behind in its efforts to meet its commitments to the EU in five key areas - services, trade law, agriculture, judiciary reform and corruption.