SOFIA (AFP) – Thousands of people rallied in the Bulgarian capital yesterday in demonstrations organized by opposition parties ahead of a scheduled no-confidence vote against the leftist government. Police estimated that around 5,000 demonstrators gathered outside the parliament building, while organizers put the number of protesters at 15,000. Some 1,500 police officers were deployed in the streets, forming a chain around the parliament building where debate on the no-confidence motion was taking place. The motion, which was filed by 79 opposition right-wing and nationalist parties last week, is to be put to the vote today amid allegations of corruption against the Socialist-led government of Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev.

VODEN (AFP) – Until recently, more than 100 rusty military tanks lay half-buried and almost forgotten in deserted fields near Bulgaria’s southeastern border, planted as a Cold War deterrent to NATO’s southern flank. But the theft of a rare vintage model sent the army scurrying this month to start a recovery operation to save those still left from looters. “Collectors, and especially the fans of the ‘Fuhrer’ (Adolf Hitler)... are prepared to pay huge sums of money to have one of these,” the deputy director of Sofia’s military history museum, Blagoy Milenov, told AFP. So far, 12 tanks have been pulled from the fields since the operation started on Feburary 6. A Defense Ministry agency is storing them until the army decides their fate.

The trial of a Bosnian war veteran accused of attempting to bomb the US Embassy in Vienna opened in the Austrian capital yesterday, with the defendant claiming he wanted to deposit dangerous material in the embassy’s care. The 42-year-old man, identified by his forename Acim, was arrested on October 1 after trying to enter the US Embassy with a rucksack containing nails and explosives. The Bosnian, who was placed in a prison psychiatric ward, told the court yesterday he wanted to become “an informer for the United States” as he supported its “fight against terrorism” and that he was just trying to deposit “dangerous material” in the embassy’s care. (AFP)

Serbian President Boris Tadic arrived in Bucharest yesterday for a short one-day visit to Romania, one of only five EU countries not to recognize Kosovo’s independence. Shortly after his arrival, Tadic was welcomed by his Romanian counterpart Traian Basescu for half an hour of talks at Cotroceni Palace. (AFP)