Bulgarian Foreign Minister: PM Borissov cannot be criticised for dialogue with Turkey
Bulgaria has done nothing but defend the common EU migration policy in its talks with Turkey, and Prime Minister Boiko Borissov cannot be criticised for conducting active bilateral dialogue with that country, Foreign Minister Daniel Mitov said on August 31.
Mitov was speaking against a background of Borissov’s successive visits to Istanbul and Berlin, where he held talks, respectively, with Turkey’s president and prime minister and Germany’s chancellor on the migration crisis.
Borissov has conveyed to German chancellor and the EU his insistence that a deal on a readmission agreement on refugees and the lifting of visas for Turkish citizens, scheduled to be discussed by EU leaders in October with a view to possible endorsement, should go ahead.
Bulgarian media have claimed that Borissov is carrying out a form of shuttle diplomacy as a “mediator” between Turkey and the EU on the migrant crisis. The Bulgarian Prime Minister has underlined his view that if the Turkey deal does not go ahead, his country and Greece – and by extension the EU – could face a flood of refugees and migrants from across the Turkish border.
Speaking in a television interview, Mitov said that no month is tranquil in terms of migration flows from Turkey to Bulgaria, which made Borissov’s visit to Istanbul last week of utmost importance to Bulgaria.
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(Archive photo: Bulgarian Prime Minister Boiko Borissov, foreground, and Foreign Minister Daniel Mitov)
