Bulgaria's Foreign Minister Mladenov has accused President Parvanov of giving political cover to the Bulgarian diplomats who were revealed to have worked for the State Security (DS) service of the former communist regime.

After earlier on Friday the President said that 10 of the 41 acting Bulgarian diplomats with communist secret service past were appointed by the current center-right GERB government, Mladenov reacted by declaring that these appointments were started by former Socialist-led government of Sergey Stanishev, and that the Borisov Cabinet had to finalize them by law.

"Almost all of the advisers of Georgi Parvanov, who is known himself to have collaborated with the former State Security under the name "Gotse", are also former agents. I am not going to send any of these people as ambassadors abroad," Mladenov said on Friday.

"The President can speak whatever he wants but I would like to declare that he personally is the political cover for all former structures of the State Security in Bulgaria. It is not even the Bulgarian Socialist Party that backs them, it is the President himself that is covering them. He should not explain anything to me other than give answer to the question why 50% of the Bulgarian ambassadors sent abroad during his term belonged to the former State Security," stated the top diplomat, who has made clear over the recent days his indignation over the overwhelming presence of ex agents in the Bulgarian diplomatic corps.

Mladenov, however, does not see the issue in outrightly black and white terms, saying that the communist system engulfed many people who then worked honestly for Bulgaria's interests in the past 20 years.

He believes that Bulgaria must finally close the page of the former State Security, or join the group of a few countries that are unable to cope with their own past. He underscored the fact that 45% of the Bulgarian diplomats in the past 20 years were involved with the former communist secret service, and that the number of these appointments did not recede but actually increased in the recent years, during the terms of Parvanov as President since 2002.

"I declare once again - all this is over in Bulgaria, and from now on there will be no more appointments of ambassadors or consuls who discredit the nation in such a way. This is a glass cover they have put on the Foreign Ministry in the recent years. This way young people who have had the ambition, education, and capacities to create Bulgaria's new image have had no way of getting ahead," Mladenov said.

On Tuesday, a special Bulgarian panel, investigating the communist-era police files, known as the Files' Commission, revealed that 192 Bulgarian Foreign Ministry employees have had ties with the former communist State Security.

Among those 192, 33 are diplomats currently working abroad Nikolay Mladenov pointed out, these include Ambassadors, Consuls and Deputy Directors of diplomatic missions in Great Britain, Germany, Italy, the UN (New York and Geneva), Portugal, Spain, the Netherlands, Turkey, Russia, China, Sweden, Romania, Norway, Japan, Qatar, Kuwait, Syria, Egypt, Bosnia, Greece, the Vatican,Slovakia, Albania, Georgia, Armenia and Venezuela are among those exposed as former Bulgarian State Security's collaborators.

Bulgarian President Georgi Parvanov, who himself was revealed in 2006 to have been a collaborator of State Security under the name "Gotse", defended the diplomats who worked for the communist intelligence. He reacted strongly to the suggestion of Prime Minister Boyko Borisov to fire those who are on active duty.

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