Bulgaria drops opposition to bridge loan to Athens
Bulgaria’s Prime Minister Boyko Borisov said on Friday his non-eurozone country would no longer oppose an emergency bridge loan for Greece, after being assured by Brussels it would not have to pay for its neighbor.
Government officials earlier had hinted that the European Union’s poorest member state would oppose a three-month 7-billion-euro bridging loan for Greece proposed by the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm.
Right-wing Borisov however told parliament on Friday the Commission had confirmed that Bulgaria would not have to contribute “a single Bulgarian lev… for the Greeks.”
“The European Commission… gave us absolute guarantees that Bulgaria… will not in any way lose, pay, or take money out of its budget to save Greece,” he said.
Borisov warned it would be neither “European” nor “neighborly” if Bulgaria turned out to be the only country in the 28-member European Union to oppose the plan.
[AFP]
