Socialist leader and presidential candidate Georgi Purvanov, who was in the Blagoevgrad region on October 24, said at his campaign meetings he wanted to raise the issue of sending Bulgarian troops to Macedonia, referring to statements by Prime Minister Simeon Saxe-Coburg and President Petur Stoyanov. `To me this is a short-sighted position, and the most inappropriate thing now would be to send Bulgarian troops to neighbouring fraternal Macedonia,` Purvanov said. `Joint ventures are needed to invigorate economic exchange between us,` he added. `Bulgaria has never intended to send its children to fight, let alone die, in Macedonia or elsewhere,` President Peter Stoyanov told journalists in Simitli (Southwestern Bulgaria) on October 24. Stoyanov explained he had said that if the Macedonian government and the international organizations of which Bulgaria is a member asked it to participate in peacekeeping operations, it would do so. `Bulgaria has participated in such operations in the last four years,` Stoyanov said, recalling there are Bulgarian troops in Bosnia. There are three conditions for sending Bulgarian soldiers: first, they must be professional soldiers; second, they should agree to this; and third, they must be paid. `However, sending Bulgarian soldiers to the front has never been on the agenda,` Stoyanov said.

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