Bulgaria's Prime Minister Boyko Borisov announced Wednesday that the main administration of the Bulgarian Academy of Science (BAS) will not be shut down.

Borisov explained that the Cabinet had never planned to close down the establishment and that it will continue to be primary fund allocator to the respective BAS institutes.

The announcement was made after PM Borisov met with BAS scholar Nikola Sabotinov who handed him a declaration written by Bulgaria's academics in protest to the government's plans to reform the Academy.

The Bulgarian prime minister pointed out that the closing down of the main BAS administrative unit is a mere speculation and that the Cabinet has no intention of infringing upon the Academy's autonomy.

“All state institutions have to cut down its personnel and BAS is no exception,” commented Borisov on the fact that BAS has already cut down its staff by 10 %.

The number of BAS institutes has already been brought down from 69 to 40.

The 40 remaining institutes are to be divided into 9 thematic units with 8 of them now fully determined. The only one with a question mark so far is the future of the Liberal Arts where the reform met the strongest opposition.

Each unit will be led by a Consulting Scientific Counsel with a team of scientists from the sector from BAS and universities around the country, representatives of Ministries and State Institutions and European experts.

The 8 units are: 1. Information and Communications Sciences 2. Energy Resources and Effectiveness 3. New Materials and Technologies 4. Biomedicine and Quality of Life 5. Biodiversity, Bioresources and Ecology 6. Climate Changes, Risks and Natural Resources 7. Astronomy, Space Research and Technologies and 8. Social Sciences.

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