The parliamentary group of "There is such a people" (ITN) issued a declaration regarding the lifting of the monitoring of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) over Bulgaria and demanded that Nadezhda Yordanova ("We continue the change-Democratic Bulgaria") explain why she voted "abstain". The declaration was read by the deputy chairman of the ITN PG Stanislav Balabanov from the rostrum of the National Assembly.
Yesterday, after 27 years, PACE monitoring was lifted, this means that Bulgaria has fulfilled all the conditions of the Council of Europe and is its full member, BTA pointed out. It means that Bulgaria is not a second-rate country, Balabanov commented. The term “ethnic Macedonians in Bulgaria” was also dropped from the report, thanks to the efforts of all Bulgarian parties, institutions and representatives in PACE. Every Bulgarian representative in PACE, who is part of the European political families, managed to convince his colleagues of Bulgaria's rightness, which is why the EPP, the Conservatives and the Socialists stood behind us and supported us on this occasion, he pointed out.
Balabanov noted that when voting on the resolution, there were 101 "for", 3 votes "against" and one "abstention". The result is overwhelming in favor of Bulgaria, he commented. Balabanov said that logically the ones who voted against were the representatives from North Macedonia. However, there is something else that is incomprehensible, generates disgust, bewilderment and absolute contempt. There is one "abstained" vote, he said.
"The sad truth is that the vote that abstained is Bulgarian. This is the vote of the representative of "Democratic Bulgaria" Nadezhda Yordanova. There is no more anti-Bulgarian vote than this," Balabanov commented and called on Yordanova to come to the podium to explain her actions. Why are you working and will you continue to work against the interests of Bulgaria, while your party passionately continues to call itself "Democratic Bulgaria", Balabanov asked.
Yesterday, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) decided to end the post-monitoring dialogue with Bulgaria and to monitor the country's development within the framework of periodic reviews, the institution said in a statement.