Montenegro’s Deputy Premier and Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration Igor Luksic paid a working visit to Bulgaria. Minister Luksic said his visit proved the high significance of Montenegro’s bilateral relations with Bulgaria. Sofia was in fact the first stop of Montenegro Deputy Premier’s foreign visits in 2016. In the first day of his visit to Sofia, the media in Montenegro announced that the cabinet in Podgorica officially nominated Igor Luksic to become Secretary General of the United Nations.

It became clear after the talks in Sofia that the bilateral relations between Bulgaria and Montenegro were traditionally at a good level, yet their legal and contractual basis has to be updated. This was proved by their commitment to sign a bilateral social security agreement. The document abrogates old regulations in the social security field adopted back in 1957 and allows the citizens of these countries to move freely and meanwhile keep their social and healthcare rights in their home country. Experts believe that the agreement makes Montenegro’s EU accession talks easier under chapter 19 related to the free movement of citizens and in this sense the signature of the agreement could be also interpreted as support towards Montenegro’s European perspective. Bulgaria and Montenegro will also sign similar agreements in the education, tourism and investments field.

The visit of Minister Luksic to Sofia is paid in a moment when Montenegro’s perspective to join NATO is a highly delicate topic. In December 2015 the small Balkan country was invited to become a NATO member. However, Russia warned that if Montenegro joined the North-Atlantic Alliance, it would suspend all its projects in that country. Two weeks before the start of the accession talks, Bulgaria’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Daniel Mitov assured his counterpart during their meeting in Sofia that when the agreement between Montenegro and NATO is signed, Bulgaria would be among the first countries to ratify that agreement. Thus, Bulgaria’s cabinet confirmed its stand that a possible accession of Montenegro to NATO does not pose a threat on Russia and would boost the democratization and the stability of the Balkan state, thus contributing to the overall stability of the whole Balkan region.

Minister Mitov promised to Minister Luksic assistance in the judicial and power engineering fields.

The visit of Montenegro’s Deputy Premier to Bulgaria fits into a broader framework as well. Today, during the second day of that visit to Bulgaria, Sofia hosts the informal meeting of the South-East European Cooperation Process. The meeting of South-East European foreign ministers and high officials in Bulgaria’s capital Sofia shows that twenty years after its establishment, the South-East European Cooperation Process continues to strengthen the interrelations of the participants and helps them deal with the most-important challenges. One of these challenges regards the unprecedented migrant flow passing through that region.

English version: Kostadin Atanasov