Spanish member of the European Parliament David Hammerstein, MEP for the Los Verdes, which is part of the European Greens, will visit Bulgaria between May 1-4, a media statement from the Bulgarian Greens said on April 30.

Hammerstein is the third Green MEP to visit Bulgaria, after Margrete Auken and Gisela Kallenbach.

Hammerstein will be touring some of the most debated locations in Bulgaria's environmental politics and he will meet with representatives of Maritsa Iztok 1, 2 and 3 thermal power plant as well as Bourgas mayor Dimitar Nikolov, who is also a member of a civil committee opposing the construction of the Bourgas-Alexandroupolis pipeline.

According to the Bulgarian Greens media statement, Hammerstein was expected to express the position of the European Greens on "the destruction of Bulgarian nature by ongoing construction in protected Nature 2000 areas."

Hammerstein was expected to comment on answers received from the European Commission (EC) by the European and Bulgarian Greens to questions about the ongoing destruction of Bulgarian nature along the Black Sea coast and in the Rila mountains. In the answers, environment commissioner Stavros Dimas said that the EC was ready to request from the Bulgarian government to include the Rila Buffer and Irakli into the Natura 2000 network as soon as it finishes the analyses of findings of scientific research into the reasons to preserve these areas.

Hammerstein was also expected to express the support from the European Greens for the Bulgarian Greens political party which is announced to be established on May 18.