Bulgaria drops opposition to EU bridge loan for Greece

(SOFIA) - Bulgaria's Prime Minister Boyko Borisov said Friday his non-eurozone country would no longer oppose an emergency bridge loan for Greece, after being assured by Brussels it would not have to pay for its neighbour.

Government officials earlier had hinted that the EU's poorest member state would oppose a three-month 7-billion-euro ($7.6 billion) bridging loan for Greece proposed by the European Commission, the EU's executive arm.

Right-wing Borisov however told parliament on Friday the Commission had confirmed that Bulgaria would not have to contribute "a single Bulgarian lev (currency)...for the Greeks".

"The European Commission... gave us absolute guarantees that Bulgaria... will not in any way lose, pay, or take money out of its budget to save Greece," he said.

Borisov warned it would be neither "European" nor "neighbourly" if Bulgaria turned out to be the only country in the 28-member European Union to oppose the plan.

"An unstable Greece next door would be a monstrous thing. If you were in my shoes, you would take the same decision. You would not make Bulgaria the gravedigger of Greece."

In earlier comments to Bulgarian media, deputy premiers Rumyana Bachvarova and Tomislav Donchev had said Bulgaria would most probably resist the bid to use the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism (EFSM) to help Greece.

Non-euro Britain and the Czech Republic have also resisted the use of the fund, but European officials have said that a compromise was in the works and could be finalised on Friday.

Bulgaria, which is not part of the 19-member eurozone currency bloc, has remained among the most financially disciplined and least indebted states at the cost of strict austerity measures that left salaries and pensions at their lowest across the EU.

As a result, many politicians and ordinary Bulgarians have grumbled against any proposals to shore up their more undisciplined southern neighbour by taking money out of their pockets.