Bulgaria has signed a memorandum to borrow 4.5 billion leva from the European Investment Bank (EIB) between now and 2013, Kapital weekly reported.
The EIB would thus become Bulgaria’s most important creditor and a “key player” in the use of EU funds.
The memorandum ended Bulgaria’s trend of decreasing its public external debt and by 2013 the debt would double, Kapital said. Bulgaria’s external debt was 4.6 billion euro in July 2006.
Until recently, the International Monetary Fund pressured Bulgaria to pay off its debts and to avoid incurring further debt, Kapital said.
The EIB would co-finance by 500 to 700 million euro a year infrastructure projects financed by EU structural and cohesion funds.
The EIB had lent Bulgaria 1.2 billon euro since 1992, Kapital said.
