Eurasia

Bulgaria needs a new assesment of terrorist threats against it, officially stated Bulgaria’s Consultative Council on National Security, which was assembled by President Rosen Plevneliev Thursday. The July 18 suicide bombing against a bus full of Israeli tourists in the Bulgarian sea resort city of Burgas, which killed 6 people, …

Talks aimed at normalizing relations between Kosovo and Serbia, are due to resume after Serbia forms a new government, Ashton tells Kosovo leader Hashim Thaci.Pristina and Belgrade are set to resume talks once a new government in Serbia is in place, the EU’s High Representative, Catherine Ashton, announced on Wednesday. …

Aleksandar Vulin, head of new office coordinating all 17 ministries on Kosovo, says he will never shake hands with Kosovo leaders and issues ringing defence of Serbian-funded bodies in Kosovo.”No one will ever shake hands with [Kosovo Prime Minister Hashim] Thaci.” So said Aleksandar Vulin, the hardline new head of …

Although all parties agree on the need to change the constitution to lift the immunity of high state officials, they remain divided on when the vote should taker place.Albania’s Council of Legislation, a parliamentary body tasked with drafting amending the constitution, on Tuesday approved a draft reform agreed by both …

Some 23 charter flights from Israel have been cancelled since the recent suicide bombing in Burgas on the Black Sea, the Bulgarian Tourism Minister said, adding that every effort must be made to keep cancellations to a minimum.Delyan Dobrev, the Bulgarian Economy, Energy and Tourism Minister, said the cancellations had …

Serbia’s Public Procurement Office has found irregularities in procurements worth up to 70 million euro in the first half of 2012 – three times more than in the whole of 2011.Predrag Jovanovic, head of the Procurement Office, said uncovered irregularities in urgent public procurements for first six months of 2012 …

Jailed former police minister Ljube Boskoski is the prime suspect for the killing of Marjan Tusevski, who was shot dead by unidentified hitmen 11 years ago in Skopje.Macedonian police on Tuesday arrested nine other former police officials who are also suspected in relation to the unsolved murder of Tusevski, a …

Trying to convince increasingly sceptical international lenders that it is serious about slashing its debts, Greece named a new privatisation chief today and said it would sell a loss-making bank that has been draining state coffers.The latest visit to Athens by inspectors from the European Union, European Central Bank and …

EU official warns Bosnia that a significant amount of its exports to Croatia may be cut off next year, owing to its failure to impose EU hygiene standards.After Croatia joins the European Union in July 2013, Bosnia may face sharp reductions in its exports, as the country has not harmonized …

Supporters of Traian Basescu are being urged to abstain from the vote at end of July, in order to invalidate the result of the referendum on impeaching the President.Romania’s opposition Democratic Liberal Party, PDL, on Tuesday urged its followers not to vote in a July 29 referendum on whether to …