Bulgaria to repair 7M leva Turkish border fence, tilting after less than a year
Bulgaria will repair its seven million leva (about 3.5 million euro) 30km fence at the border with Turkey, tilting in places less than a year after it was inaugurated.
The fence was built at the time of the now-departed “Oresharski” administration against the flow of illegal migration into Bulgaria across the Turkish border.
Built amid considerable controversy about the price tag and how the contracts were handed out, the fence is tilting, for reasons reportedly ranging from parts of it having been bent by the strong winds of the past autumn, to the hasty and incompetent installation of supporting steel poles.
Prime Minister Boiko Borissov told reporters on May 24 that the fence would be repaired.
Asked if he had discussed the matter with Defence Minister Nikolai Nenchev, he said that it was not Nenchev’s business.
Reports said that Border Police had used poles and sticks to prop up the fence in several places so that it would not collapse completely.
The fence started to tilt in October 2014, but repairs to it began a week ago, Georgi Kalaidzhiev, head of the Border Police in Elhovo, told local media. The repairs were assigned to the military.
Representatives of an Interior Ministry trade union told bTV that the condition of the fence had been known for a long time. At meetings with the leadership of the ministry, they had asked when it would be fixed, but had no response, they said.
The current government has announced plans to extend the fence throughout the entire length of the Bulgarian – Turkish border.
