Deutsche Bank-London representatives confirmed their interest in the privatisation of Bulgaria's tobacco monopoly Bulgartabac at a meeting with Deputy Prime Minister and Economy Minister Nikolay Vassilev March 5.

The meeting was at the request of Deutsche Bank.

At the end of February, right after President Parvanov imposed a veto on the amendments to the Privatisation Act, concerning Bulgartabac among fifteen Bulgarian companies, Minister Vassilev expressed the hope that Deutsche Bank will not withdraw from Bulgaria.

He underlined that he personally will continue to make efforts to keep Deutsche Bank in Bulgaria.

Parliament overrode President Parvanov's veto on the controversial amendments February 27 with the votes of 125 MPs of the ruling Simeon II National Movement and its junior coalition partner the Movement for Rights and Freedoms. Fifteen key privatisation deals in Bulgaria, including Bulgartabac and the Bulgarian Telecommunications Company, were exempted from judicial control under the amendments.

The amendments to the Privatisation Act will come into effect March 7, after President Parvanov signed the decree for promulgating them March 4.

The amendments are to affect the privatisation of Bulgaria's tobacco monopoly Bulgartabac, but not the major deal for Bulgarian Telecommunications Company BTC, where a preferred buyer has already been named.

On January 15 Bulgaria's Privatisation Agency did not ask Tobacco Capital Partners to confirm the validity of its bid for an 80% stake in Bulgaria's tobacco giant. The move prompted talks that this could be interpreted as effectively disqualifying the provisional winner in the tobacco sale from the process, heeding a judgement of the Supreme Administrative Court.

Tobacco Capital Partners was set up exclusively to participate in the privatization procedure of Bulgartabac in consortium with Clar Inns, 100 percent owned by Deutsche Bank.

Representatives of Austria's Tobacco Holding GmbH will conduct due diligence at tobacco monopoly Bulgartabac Holding from March 4 to March 8 to get acquainted with the updated data. Then they will be allowed to sweeten their offers.

The other bidder Rosbulgartabac was to conduct due diligence from March 10th till March 14th.