BULGARIA: AMBASSADOR'S JULY 16 MEETING WITH PRIME MINISTER STANISHEV

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 SOFIA 000863

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EUR/NCE NORDBERG

E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/18/2017
TAGS: PGOV, PREL, PARM, NATO, KCRM, KCOR, ECON, ENRG, LY, BU
SUBJECT: BULGARIA: AMBASSADOR'S JULY 16 MEETING WITH PRIME
MINISTER STANISHEV

Classified By: Ambassador John Beyrle for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)

1. SUMMARY. The Ambassador met one-on-one with Prime Minister
Sergey Stanishev July 16 and reviewed a number of current
issues. Topics covered included the release of nurses
imprisoned in Libya, Iraq/Afghanistan, cabinet changes,
Kosovo, the extradition treaty, bases, and economic issues.
Stanishev said while the Interior Minister was still fighting
his plans to shake up the security service structure, his
coalition partners supported the proposal. Looking as
relaxed and confident as ever, Stanishev joked that the
strong support voiced by President Bush in their June 11
meeting was welcome, but also created new challenges: "once
you are labelled 'Mr. Clean,' some people expect you can
solve all their problems for them." End summary.

Libya and the Bulgarian Nurses
--------------
2. (SBU) Stanishev said the one-day delay in the Higher
Judicial Council's ruling communitng the death sentences
occurred because of the need to get sign-offs from the
children's families. The overall deal still seemed to be
holding, but Bulgaria had no sense of how fast the transfer
might take place. This all depended on the Libyans, and how
quickly they wanted (and were able) to dispose of matters. A
reduction in the sentence would make it easier legally to
effect their transfer to Bulgaria under the bilateral
judicial agreement. The European Commission has offered a
plane to fly to Libya, pick them up and deliver them to
another EU member state, where a Bulgarian plane will be
waiting to complete their return. "They were quite insistent
on this," Stanishev said, although he said the Bulgarians had
turned down the EU offer to fly them into Sofia on an EC
plane as bad optics. Throughout the discussion, the PM
repeatedly said how much Bulgaria appreciated the consistent
US support on the nurses and recognized how decisive that
support has been.

3. (SBU) Stanishev said the paperwork had already been
drafted to grant the nurses a full pardon immediately after
they arrived in Sofia -- it was inconceivable that they
should spend even a night in custody in Bulgaria, no matter
how it might be perceived in Libya. The Ambassador asked if
the government was planning any warning to the 1000-plus
Bulgarians living and working in Libya to keep a low profile
if the pardon led to a violent backlash. Stanishev said they
hadn't considered this; most Bulgarians in Libya were working
on private contracts, without any formal link to the Embassy
or GoB. He said the Presidency had convened a working group
to coordinate all aspects of the release, and he would ask
them to consider readiness for any backlash.

National Agency for Security
--------------
4. (C) Stanishev said he had several direct and even
"emotional" discussions with Minister of Interior Petkov, who
continued to resist the PM's planned security agency
reorganization. Some of his opposition was being fuelled by
the "professional" level within the MoI stemming from
personal interests of individuals. For instance, Gen.
Iliyev's position as General Secretary of the MoI would be
harder to justify after the reorganization, since a large
part of his function was coordinating activities of MoI u
nits (e.g., National Security Service - NSS) that would no
longer be part of the Ministry.

5. (C) Stanishev admitted that the Interior Minister had not
yet seen Sertov's draft law for the new agency. He recalled
that the MoI had produced a draft at the very beginning of
the process that would have created another
coordinative/analytical body without any operational
component. This was not what Stanishev had in mind and he
had asked his own national security advisor Petko Sertov to
produce his own draft. Much of the discussion with
tripartite coalition partners, Simeon and Dogan, had focused
on this issue of operational vs. coordinative functions.
Simeon and Dogan expressed support for the PM's plan,but
decided for tactical reasons to set up a working group
comprising representatives of the three coalition parties to
review the draft and listen to different views, both from
professionals and experts -- including MoI Petkov.

6.(C) The Ambassador raised concern about the sudden
appearance of a General Secretary position in the
reorganization. Stanishev was unaware of it ("I'm not
involved in every detail") but said it might be something
required by their law on public administration. He said U.S.
experts should pass their views to Sertov and the position

SOFIA 00000863 002 OF 003


could be removed if there were no legal obstacles. The
Ambassador also urged that the regulatory authorities of the
Financial Intelligence Agency be kept intact. Stanishev said
the Agency was given its own semi-autonomous status in the
reorganization; he had asked Sertov to look very closely at
what would work best because he felt the PM did not have a
clear enough oversight of the economic aspects of national
security, which were significant.

Cabinet Changes at Ministry of Economy and Energy and
Ministry of Justice
-------------- --------------
7. (SBU) Stanishev said he had faced a difficult choice on
Economy/Energy. In choosing Petar Dimitrov as new, he had
opted for a reliable professional who was also a decent
person (PM shorthand for "not corrupt"). Downsides were his
lack of experience in the Executive Branch and energy sector,
but he would get a lot of help, including directly from the
PM. Lack of English was also a drawback. Stanishev said
that while the other candidate, Petar Kanev, would have been
a popular choice with the media and business community, Kanev
had worked closely in the past with shady energy businessman
Krassimir Georgiev. Since Georgiev's ties to ex-minister
Ovcharov had hastened Ovcharov's departure, it would have
been inconvenient politically" and lacking credibility to
replace him with Kanev. Stanishev said he did not know the
new Minister of Justice Miglena Tacheva well, but knew she
was energetic and had the will to make changes, which her
predecessor Petkanov had lacked.

Kosovo
--------------
8. (SBU) The Ambassador briefed Stanishev on the state of
play on the "minimalist" UNSC in NY, which the Russians
had,in a word, trashed. Stanishev said the Bulgarians
continued to try to influence the more moderate side of the
Serbian political spectrum (read: Tadic) to recognize and
speak publicly about the European perspective for Serbia, but
this was practically impossible during an election year.
Instead of fighting the problem, the Serbs needed to focus on
improving standards and implementation of provisions in the
Ahtissari plan. But even moderate Serbs did not believe that
provisions in the Ahtissari plan would actually be
implemented. Stanishev again probed our firmness on
partition, as Serbian interlocutors continue to raise this
with him and partition was a nightmare scenario for Sofia.
The Ambassador responded that U.S. opposition to partition
remained firm.

Iraq, Afghanistan and HMMWVs
--------------
9. (SBU) The Ambassador informed Stanishev that the Embassy
was expecting a delegation from Washington July 19-20 to
discuss our cooperation in Iraq and Afghanistan. The
Ambassador explained that we were beginning to look at other
potential missions for coalition partners, one of which was
the middle ring security for the UN mission inside the Green
Zone. Stressing that this was not a formal request or
proposal, the Ambassador wanted to share with him ideas that
were being discussed informally and that might be raised
during the delegation's meetings. Stanishev simply nodded
but did not offer any other reaction. On the HMMWV issue,
Ambassador said that while the U.S. respected Bulgaria's
desire to have the best equipment for its forces, we
encouraged them to accept our offer of a loan of ten HMMWV
1025s made in response to President Parvanov's request to
President Bush. He confirmed that the offer was cost-free,
and reiterated that their acceptance of it would have no
effect whatsoever on the timing of delivery of the HMMWVs
ordered through FMS. Stanishev appeared unaware of the
letter from CHOD Stoykov declining the HMMWV 1025 loan and
said he would look into it.

Extradition treaty
--------------

10. (U) Stanishev confirmed that he had asked the Foreign
Ministry for a survey of practices in other EU member states
and for their legal view on the proposed treaty before
presenting it to the Council of Ministers for a final
decision. The Ambassador stressed the urgency of quick
action; Stanishev said he understood.

Bases
--------------
11. (SBU) The Ambassador pointed to the uptick in negative
press attention to the joint bases following Russia's
announcement that it was suspending its participation in the

SOFIA 00000863 003 OF 003


CFE Treaty. The extreme nationalist ATAKA party, the
Russian Embassy, and other anti-Western forces would continue
to use our military cooperation as a rallying point;
countering this would require both Stanishev and President
Parvanov to speak out reiterating Bulgaria's strategic
interests. Stanishev said this would not be a problem; his
position on the bases was consistent and principled. But he
hoped we would be able to complete the implementing
agreements as soon as possible; without them, the legal
foundation for operation of the bases was not complete, and
any small incident could take on larger public overtones.
The Ambassador informed Stanishev that the Embassy expected a
team from EUCOM to come out soon to finalize the agreements,
acknowledging that this had taken longer than expected and
that the delay was on the US, not Bulgarian side.

Looking ahead: More Interaction with the Public on
Economic Issues
-------------- --------------
12. (U) Stanishev said the Coalition Council and Council of
Ministers would meet in special session at the end of July
for a strategic review of budget priorities for the coming
year, with an eye to better communication with the citizenry.
Pressure for increases in social spending were increasing,
with doctors, teachers and miners threatening to go on strike
and pensioners threatening to protest. Part of the problem
was a failure of government to clearly explain the priorities
and tradeoffs in a modern economy, especially since fiscal
and budgetary discipline was key. Stanishev said this
discussion might be followed by a series of "town meetings"
similar to the successful open forum held on Roma issues.
These meetings could serve as a mini-referendum on government
policies and priorities.

Comment
--------------
13. (C) Stanishev continues to play a steady hand: he is
pushing forward with the reorganization of the domestic
security agencies, methodically building support within the
coalition and showing only as many of his cards as absolutely
needed, as his adviser completes the draft legislation with
continuing U.S. input. Success in steering his draft law
through to a first reading in Parliament before the summer
recess will amount to a political victory as well. While
there are strong "command and structural" reasons for the
changes he is pushing, they also serve to undercut the
authority of Interior Minister Petkov, whose inability to
score any real success in the fight against organized crime
here is a growing liability for the PM and the Socialist
Party. End comment.
Beyrle
Beyrle