These are some of the top headlines in Bulgarian newspapers on March 31 2008. The Sofia Echo has not verified these stories and cannot vouch for their accuracy.

Politics

- Interior Minister Roumen Petkov launched a counter-offensive to keep his post after the corruption row at the Interior Ministry, Dnevnik daily said. Petkov had asked politicians and leaders in the ruling coalition for support.

- Businessmen Plamen Galev and Angel Hristov, who entered media focus because of their meeting with Petkov, made a media statement related to the corruption controversy in the ministry, Dnevnik said. According to the businessmen, the whole controversy was meant to destabilise the Cabinet.

- Justice Ministry was ready to prepare a new law on the special intelligence methods, Sega daily said. Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev was expected to assign the ministry to draft the new law within a week.

-After the opposition parties had already demanded Petkov's resignation, National Movement for Stability and Progress, which is part of the ruling coalition, also rebelled against Petkov, Monitor daily said. The matter would be discussed at the following political council of the movement.
 
Social

- Companies were draining the municipal budgets by faking activity on stray dogs problem resolution, Dnevnik said. The companies aimed to keep and increase the number of stray dogs, thus receiving more funding for the problem resolution, the newspaper quoted environmental organisations as saying.

- The condition of public transport in Sofia was disastrous, Monitor said. Every two out of three trams and 92 per cent of the trolley busses did not meet the safety standards.

Economy

- The Cabinet approved changed in the trade register code, envisioning shorter, two-week-long, term for re-registration of companies, Dnevnik said. The requirement that company  names had to be unique would be abolished.