Containers with goods from the Far East and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) could be delivered to Kosovo via the Bulgarian port of Svishtov instead of Thessaloniki in Greece, Svishtov port authorities said in a media statement.

On June 19-20 2008, a Kosovar delegation visited the port to examine the prospects of part of the cargo shipped in containers from China to Kosovo to go through the Danube containers terminal in Svishtov, the port authorities said.

After the businessmen got to know the capacity of the Bulgarian port for handling container cargo and the opportunities it provided, they confirmed that the most promising and suitable route for having goods from the Far East and the CIS was through Svishtov, the statement said.

Kosovo seeks to find an alternative to Thessaloniki, from where the goods face a long road haul, and has also looked at the port of Constanta in Romania. Unlike Bulgaria, however, neither Greece, nor Romania, have recognised Kosovo so far.

The newly-born Balkan state is landlocked and has no access to a continental waterway, which makes securing the logistics of shipments made by water a key concern for the authorities in Pristina.

Svishtov is the southernmost port on the Danube. It provides the shortest connection to the inland of Bulgaria and the Western Balkan states of Kosovo and Macedonia, making it a suitable gateway to the CIS and Asia.