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In spite of their overt rivalry and oftentimes stormy conflicts, Bulgaria's President and Prime Minister have demonstrated satisfaction with the consensus they achieved over the draft National Security Strategy.
Bulgaria's National Security Council has come together around a new position designed to move ahead the adoption of the country's new national security strategy.
The Council, which includes the President, the Parliament Chair, the Prime Minister, the Ministers of Defense, Foreign Affairs, Interior, and Finance, the head of the State National Security Agency (DANS), the Head of Defense (i.e. formerly known as the head of the general staff of the army), and the chairs of all parliamentary groups, convened on Friday for discussions of a draft for a National Security Strategy.
During and after the meeting, PM Borisov, head of the ruling center-right party GERB, and President Parvanov, former chair of the now opposition Bulgarian Socialist Party (in 1997-2002), behaved rather nicely with one another despite their simmering rivalry.
"We all agreed on the unconditional necessity to draft a new National Security Strategy, a new reading of the national security topic in a time of new challenges. We had a very constructive debate in which we did not divide into government and opposition. We made amendments that will make the text sound more strategically, some of the definitions in it will be clarified. After this meeting I expect a total agreement during the final discussion and adoption of the draft by the Parliament," President Parvanov declared after the meeting.
"Each one of us should perhaps compromise with their own proposals so that we can have a consensus document," he said praising the importance of the achieved consensus.
"I think that we managed to adopt amendments with consensus, which should then be approved by all political parties," Prime Minister Borisov declared in turn emphasizing the desire of all members of the National Security Council to find consensus among themselves.
The thorny issue about the appointment of a new director of Bulgaria's military intelligence that has led to a conflict between the President on the one side and the Defense Minister and the Prime Minister on the other was not discussed at all during Friday's meeting.
Since September 1, Bulgaria's "Military Information Service" has been without a director after Parvanov refused to confirm two nominees of Defense Minister Angelov, Dincho Karamunchev and Commodore Valentin Gagashev.
Last week Prime Minister Borisov made it clear he expected that the issue would be resolved before Friday's meeting. On Friday Minister Angelov made it clear he would not back out and was firm about his second nominee Gagashev.
The President, however, said the National Security Council was not in charge of this issue, and that the dialogue about it should continue.
As the second term of the Bulgarian President is expiring in 2011 and he is now eligible to run again, he has been widely rumored to be starting a new leftist political party which is expected to become a rival of the currently ruling rightist party GERB of PM Borisov. Parvanov, however, has not made clear his future political ambitions yet.
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