Bulgaria’s Foreign Minister Passy, who attends the two-day foreign ministerial of NATO member states in Reykjavik, discussed Bulgaria’s NATO and EU bids at a meeting with his German counterpart Fischer. Fischer informed Passy about Tuesday’s discussion of the 19 foreign ministers, stressing that they agreed that the preparation of most of the applicant states, including Bulgaria, is going in the right direction. The predominant attitude now is to invite a large group of countries to join NATO at the Alliance summit in Prague; the concrete decisions will be taken shortly before the meeting and will depend on the degree of preparation of the individual applicants, Fischer said. At a later meeting, the foreign ministers of Bulgaria, Romania, Turkey and Greece that cooperation between the Balkan states will continue after Bulgaria's and Romania's accession to NATO. Passy qualified the cooperation format among the four countries, set up on february 13, as extremely efficient.