Official fanfare and a motley crowd waving the tricolore greeted French president Nicolas Sarkozy on his first official trip to Bulgaria.

His day-long visit began with him being welcomed by President Georgi Purvanov a little after noon on October 4 in front of Alexander Nevski Memorial Cathedral in Sofia. The two placed a wreath on monument to the unknown soldier, accompanied by Franco-Bulgarian singer Sylvie Vartan, who was influential in spurring the release of the seven Bulgarian medics and Palestinian doctor from their eight-year imprisonment in Libya.

Vartan, who was born in Bulgaria and whose father was Bulgarian of Armenian descent, had created an online petition in which she called on people to take it onto themselves to help the Bulgarian nurses in Libya. In December 2006 she sent an open letter of support to the Bulgarian nurses who were being held in Libyan jail on the accusation of deliberately infecting 400 children with HIV.

Sarkozy's visit, too, is in relation to his and his wife Cecilia's decisive role in helping to free the medics. The day's schedule includes a lecture at Sofia University, a meeting with Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev, and much speculation about the positive future of French-Bulgarian economic relations.