#BULGARIA: Parliament Debates Aid For Ukraine

[world politics news]

Fierce debates over whether Bulgaria should send military aid to Ukraine have dominated the country’s new parliament, complicating future coalition talks.

The election winner, Boyko Borissov’s centrist GERB party, has met with President Radev in a live-streamed discussion where the two sides clashed over the topic. 

[FULL STORY HERE]

World Politics News is dedicated to raising Americans' knowledge of political events, elections, and legislation throughout the world.

#BULGARIA: Gov't Angered By EU's Resolution Praising Anti-Gov't Protesters

[world politics news] 

Bulgaria's ruling coalition has reacted with irritation to a sharply worded European Parliament resolution adopted on October 8 that has cheered the street protesters demanding the government’s resignation.

The resolution cited high levels of corruption, deterioration in media freedoms and lack of diversity in media ownership, Bulgaria’s failure to ratify the so-called Istanbul convention on gender-based violence, or to prevent hate speech on sexual and gender grounds and against Roma people and asylum seekers.

[FULL STORY HERE]

World Politics News is dedicated to raising Americans' knowledge of political events, elections, and legislation throughout the world.

#BULGARIA: Nation Goes To The Polls In Second Round Of Voting

[world politics news]

Bulgarians vote Sunday to choose a new president in a contested runoff that has become a referendum on the fate of the country's center-right government. In the first round, Gen. Rumen Radev, 53, a former non-partisan chief of Bulgarian Air Force came in first with 25 percent of the vote and leads polls in the second round. The speaker of Parliament, Tsetska Tsacheva, a 58-year-old lawyer and member of Prime Minister Borisov's center-right party won 22 percent. For the first time, voting is compulsory.

#BULGARIA: Second Round Of Court Reform Amendments Passed

[world politics news]

Bulgarian MPs have passed a second package of amendments to the country’s Judiciary Act, part of the judiciary reform process that started after the constitutional amendments passed last year. The amendments are meant to improve court self-governance, reducing the powers of the administrative heads of individual courts, as well as increasing the accountability and decentralization of the prosecutor’s office.

#BULGARIA: Socialist Plan To Lift Parliamentarian Travel Ban Fails

[world politics news]

Parliament has defeated, in a 49-39 vote, with 39 abstaining, a Socialist-backed plan to encourage the EU to lift a ban on elected leaders visiting Russia, as a result of the eastern Ukrainian conflict aided by Russian soldiers. The Leftist parties said the ban is counter-productive to negotiations and diplomacy.

#BULGARIA: It's Official: Bulgarians Are Now Required By Law To Vote

[world politics news]

Bulgarians will be required by law to vote in elections, after the National Assembly amended the Electoral Code to introduce mandatory voting. In a divisive vote which split several parties, 109 MP's voted for the measure, while 74 opposed. The leader of the opposition Movement for Rights and Freedoms, parliament's third-largest party, said it would oppose the new law in the nation's Constitutional Court, although it ironically might help the party's performance.

#BULGARIA: Party Leader Dumped After Supporting Turkey In Russia Plane Downing

[world politics news]

The leader of Bulgaria's ethnic Turkish party has been ousted from his post and expelled from the party after declaring support for Turkey in its row with Moscow over the downing of a Russian warplane. Lyutvi Mestan, who headed the opposition Movement for Rights and Freedoms Party which represents ethnic Turks, voiced support for Turkey's action last month. Bulgaria has traditionally strong ties with Russia.

#BULGARIA: Battered Socialist Gov't Resigns After Months of Crisis

[world politics news]

PM Plamen Oresharski has resigned.

#BULGARIA: Gov't Set to Fall, Call July Election Over Gazprom Pipeline

[world politics news]