Bulgaria
External Relations
Bulgarian efforts at democratisation and modernisation in the past 15 years yielded the desired results in the period 2004-2005, with the country fulfilling some of its large-scale foreign policy goals set in 1997. The country also maintained good-neignbourly relations with the other countries in the Southeast European region.
On February 5th, 2004 the Bulgarian Council of Ministers approved of the North Atlantic Treaty and submitted to the National Assembly a proposal to ratify the Treaty. On March 1st, 2004 NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer notified then Bulgarian Minister of Foreign Affairs Solomon Passy of the entry into force of the Protocol to the North Atlantic Treaty on the Accession of the Republic of Bulgaria after its subsequent signing by all NATO member states, thus extending an official invititation to Bulgaria to accede to the North Atlantic Treaty. For its part, the Bulgarian National Assembly ratified the North Atlantic Treaty by an overwhelming majority, with Bulgaria becoming a full-fledged NATO member on March 29th, 2004 after depositing its instruments of ratification in Washington, DC. Liubomir Ivanov was appointed first Permanent Representative of Bulgaria to NATO.
Further, in 2004 Bulgaria entered the final stage of negotiations for EU accession. Those were concluded on June 15th, 2004 when all 31 negotiation chapters were closed . Bulgaria signed its EU Accession Treaty on April 25th, 2005 in Luxembourg, with the document having been ratified by the National Assembly on May 11th, 2005 with a view towards the country's achieving full-fledged membership on January 1st, 2007. After signing it Bulgaria received an observer status in EU institutions. The process of the Treaty's ratification is ongoing.
Yet, given certain difficulties in key areas experienced by the country, EU member states considered it expedient to include in the Accession Treaty three safeguard clauses - a general economic clause, justice and home affairs clause, and internal market clause - in order to ensure the continuation of EU-required reforms, most specifically those of the judiciary and the administration. An obvious Bulgarian failure to further reforms in the months after the signing of the Treaty could lead to a postponement of the country's membership by one year upon a recommendation by the European Commission (EC).
By the time full-fledged membership is granted, Bulgaria will be undergoing thorough monitoring by the EC, aimed at ensuring the country's readiness to meet all accession obligations. The EC' s conclusions on the matter are made public on a regular basis through the so called Monitoring Reports, with the last one on Bulgaria having been published in October 2005.
According to the Report, Bulgaria managed to achieve an overall compliance with the Copenhagen political criteria. Yet, the EC was particularly critical with regard to Bulgarian government's failure to adopt relevant legislation in such problematic areas as administrative and judicial reform. The Report further voiced concern about the still substantial level of corruption in highest political circles, as well as about the obvious ineffectiveness in the fight against organised crime.The document also recognised the overall successful transposition of EU directives into Bulgarian legislation, but stressed the importance of speeding up the legislative process for complete alignment with the acquis communautaire, much needed after the loss of legislative momentum after the general elections of June 2005.
Also the period was marked by intense regional cooperation for Bulgaria. In 2004, Bulgaria held the Chairmanship of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Thus, the country, and most specifically then Bulgarian Foreign Minister Solomon Passy in his capacity as Chairman-in-Office, was directly involved in overseeing activities related to conflict prevention, crisis management, and post-conflict reconstruction, many of those affecting countries in Bulgaria's proximity.In December 2004 Sofia hosted the 12th OSCE Ministerial Council.