In Tirana, Bulgarian President Rosen Plevneliev took over the rotating presidency of the South-East European Cooperation Process (SEECP) from his Albanian counterpart Bujar Nishani. In the course of twenty years since the Process started in Sofia back in 1996 Bulgaria has held the presidency twice - in 1996-1997 and in 2007-2008. The first presidency prioritized cooperation in stability and security, economic development, justice and combating organized crime. To those priorities the second Bulgarian presidency added strengthening of regional cooperation in interaction with the European Union, furtherance of the European and Atlantic integration of the region's countries and reaching an internationally recognized solution about the status of Kosovo. In the period 2015-2016 the third Bulgarian presidency will concentrate on three main points of cooperation - energy and infrastructure cohesion, media freedom and freedom of expression, migration and tackling the refugee flow.

As the Bulgarian presidency is about to begin, chances are strong for furtherance in cooperation in infrastructure. By 2020, the European Commission plans to invest close to 50 billion euro in regional transport and energy projects. Given the financial resources Sofia's ambition in the coming months is to make sure that funds released are allocated mostly to upgrading the regional infrastructure, to diversification of the sources and routes for energy resources transiting and to connecting national gas and electricity networks.

The presidency will be working in the context of an unprecedented refugee pressure on a few of the region's countries. In this situation it is going to develop regional policies based on solidarity to those hurt in this process and to mobilize joint efforts for dealing with the migration wave and with demographic challenges.

Quite predictably the Bulgarian SEECP presidency will be marked by the recent dramatic developments in Macedonia that triggered controversial reactions from the world including fears of that country's breakup and partition by neighbouring countries. At the SEECP summit in Tirana these fears were denied by President Plevneliev with the explicit statement that “the borders in the Balkans should be removed rather than modified” and with the vow that Bulgaria was going to work for the adoption of a Joint Declaration for the reassertion of the principle of non-violation of the region's borders.

The Tirana summit has left the impression that the European integration of the Western Balkan countries was not so keenly discussed as usual. The economic crisis continues and there is a feeling of tiredness for accepting new members. It seems that the European Commission is about to have a break from enlargement. This showed in the proviso that the Bloc should encourage progress in negotiations provided applicant countries comply with all necessary preconditions and criteria.

In the meantime the Bulgarian presidency is aware of the need of closer cooperation of the South-East European Cooperation Process and other EU formats of regional dialogue including the Danube Strategy, the strategy for the Adriatic-Ionian region and the Black Sea Economic Cooperation Organization. Hopefully this won't divert attention from the main goal, i.e. accession of the Western Balkans to the European Union.  

English Daniela Konstantinova