Center-right GERB party declared it would try to set up a minority government following its victory in the general elections held Sunday.

Though official results are yet to be made public, current data shows GERB won the vote by over 32.5 percent.

At its press conference on Monday the party asserted political talks would take place with every force that made it into Parliament.
It also left the door open to coalitions, but ruled out any prospect of forming a cabinet with the runner-up, the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (DPS), which came third.

Party officials made clear talks could however be conducted with both entities if they wish to discuss their prospective support for certain policies.

Tsvetan Tsvetanov, one of GERB's key members and also former Interior Minister, urged smaller parties to increase readiness to compromise.

Another official, Rumyana Bachvarova, said even though a coalition with the Reformist Bloc was plausible, it "cannot happen", since the coalition had already set out a condition, declaring the two parties would shake hands only if GERB leader Boyko Borisov is not the next Prime Minister.

Tsvetanov earlier told the Bulgarian National Television it was crystal clear Borisov should be the next PM and other parties have no ground to ask for anything else.

Nevertheless GERB still looks at RB and, possibly, at the Patriotic Front, a nationalist alliance which also made it into Parliament, as potential partners, the party said. 

Conservatives announced just after polls closed on Sunday evening they would not hold a media conference until the next day or the day after.

In the days around the elections, Borisov himself pointed unless political stability is reached, a new crisis could lead the country to a new snap poll as early as this Christmas.

Some parties have already agreed Borisov is an acceptable head of the next government, but others are voicing fervent resistance.

GERB, which won the 2009 general poll, its debut in parliamentary elections, but narrowly fell short of a majority, managed to form a minority government back then, counting on the support of nationalist Ataka and the right-wing Blue Coalition, a de-facto predecessor of the Reformist Bloc.