An air alert was announced in Odessa and Odesa region at 23:37 local time, reported in "Telegram" the mayor of the city, Gennady Trukhanov, reported BTA. He indicated that the alert was announced due to the threat of drones and called on all citizens to take cover until the alert is lifted.
Sirens in Odessa were activated for the second time last night after an alert was issued at 18:41 due to the threat of ballistic missiles fired from the Crimean peninsula.
On the evening of June 18, a delegation arrived in Odessa to participate in the Nineteenth World Meeting of the Bulgarian Media, which is organized by BTA and will take place hybridly on-site in Odessa, Bolgrad, Izmail and Zarya (Kamchik) and in an electronic environment as a sign of support for the Bulgarian community in Odesa region.
The Bulgarian delegation includes the director general of BTA Kiril Valchev, the director general of the Bulgarian National Radio Milen Mitev, the chairman of the Council for Electronic Media Gabriela Naplatanova, the rector of Sofia University Prof. Dr. Georgi Valchev, the consul general of Bulgaria in Odessa Svetoslav Ivanov, the executive director of the Executive Agency for Bulgarians Abroad Raina Mandjukova, the deputy general director of BTA Evgenia Drumeva, as well as representatives of Bulgarian media and Bulgarian-language media from various countries around the world.
There are over 150,000 Bulgarians in the region and they are the third largest community according to the official census in Ukraine in 2001. About 50-60 thousand Bulgarians live in the city of Odessa itself. The largest compact Bulgarian population is concentrated in the Bolgrad, Izmail and Belgorodnist regions.
Meanwhile, Ukraine has cleared the way for creating a common area for roaming mobile communications with EU member states, DPA reported, quoted by BTA.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy signed legislative amendments on Tuesday, thanks to which citizens of the 27 EU member states will be able to use their mobile phones in Ukraine without additional charges for calls, texts or internet.
"The next step is to get a positive assessment of our legislative amendments from the European side and start negotiations on joining the single roaming area with the EU," said the Minister of Digital Technologies Mikhail Fedorov.
The EU has removed roaming surcharges for Ukrainians after the Russian invasion in 2022 due to the large number of refugees.
Ukraine is the first candidate for EU membership to take this step. Kyiv hopes that with this move it will help promote investments, DPA notes.