"I want to ask you: there are 15 000 [in this hall]. If there are 1200 refugees fleeing death, will they change anything in this hall?... In my previous tenure, the worst financial and economic crisis happened to hit... Now, what is happening to us is a migration period."

Bulgaria's Prime Minister Boyko Borisov commenting on the influx of migrants into Europe and suggesting it should not affect support for his GERB party in a negative way.

On Sunday, at a congress where GERB announced its mayoral candidates in the forthcoming local elections in October, Borisov also sought to draw a parallel between migration in the Ottoman period and movement nowadays:

"Hundreds of thousands of people - women, men, children - are fleeing the yatagan [an Ottoman sabre used a lot in the Balkans against infidels in the lands which were under the Empire's rule]."

"Thousands of people fled [then] as well. Nobody likes to see their comfort is over, but as for us [Bulgarians] they [other countries] accepted us."

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