Bulgarian Govt Steps Up Bidding for European Capital of Culture in 2019

Bulgaria's Borisov Cabinet decided Wednesday to appoint the Culture Ministry as its "national coordination body" to select a Bulgarian city that is going to bid for becoming the European Capital of Culture in 2019.

Thus, the Culture Ministry has been assigned with the task of initiating a "multi-annual" program for 2015-2019 no later than 2014, which is supposed to held the selected Bulgarian city to stage a successful bid for European Capital of Culture in 2019.

This includes working together with a number of central government institutions and the National Association of Municipalities in the Republic of Bulgaria, the government press service said.

The major Bulgarian cities that have announced intention to compete for becoming the European Capital of Culture in 2019 are the capital Sofia, the Black Sea city of Varna, and the northeastern city of Shumen.

Plovdiv has the advantage of already having been a "secondary" European Capital of Culture in 1999, by the side of Thessaloniki, the Mayor pointed out.

The European Capital of Culture is a city designated by the European Union for a period of one calendar year during which it organizes a series of cultural events with a strong European dimension.

Bulgaria, together with Italy, have already been chosen to share a European City of Culture title in 2019. The exact cities, however, will be determined in 2014.