Sofia Mayor Boiko Borisov announced Friday that the European Commission had also frozen the funds for Bulgaria under the SAPARD Program, after it already did so with the PHARE and ISPA programs. Photo by Yuliana Nikolova (Sofia Photo Agency)
The Sofia Mayor Boyko Borisov said before the Bulgarian National Television Friday morning that the European Commission had frozen the funds for Bulgaria under the SAPARD program.
According to the Sofia Mayor, who is also the informal leader of the GERB party, the Bulgarian government received a letter from Brussels on Thursday, which notifies it about the freezing of the SAPARD program funds.
So far the EC has frozen the Bulgaria's funding under the two other pre-accession programs PHARE and ISPA, and over EUR 217 M under the Regional Development Program.
These measures have been taken by Brussels in the wake of the corruption scandal in Bulgaria's Road Infrastructure Agency, in which high-ranking officials were caught with bribes, but the EC has allegedly noticed other irregularities in the EU funds management procedures as well.
Before the Bulgarian National Television Mayor Borisov also commented on the argument between him and President Parvanov regarding the canceling of the celebrations for Bulgaria's National Holiday of March 3 in the wake of the Sofia-Kardam train fire.
Borisov said that by issuing an order for the canceling of the Liberation Day celebrations he did the same as the mayors of Dobrich and Shumen, the cities where the nine casualties of the train blaze come from.