Bulgarian President's Security Council to Discuss Ukraine

Bulgaria's President and party leaders will gather Monday to work on a joint position on the Ukrainian crisis.

The talks are to be held after President Rosen Plevneliev called the Consultative Council for National Security, a panel in which politicians and chiefs of security services meet to discuss urgent issues.

All chairs of parliamentary groups have said they will attend the meeting, the website Dariknews.bg has reported.

Bulgaria's Prime Minister Plamen Oresharski will also participate. Oresharski earlier declared Bulgaria will be among the EU members insisting that an assessment of the impact of sanctions against Russia be made prior to imposing any measures.

MPs failed to find a common ground on Ukraine last week and did not elaborate a joint position regarding Crimea's absorption into Russia.

All parties, with the exception of ultra-nationalist Ataka, have vowed to support Ukraine's territorial integrity, which the EU and US say has been violated through March 16's Crimean referendum on secession.

At the time of the Consultative Council's meeting, a protest organized by Ataka is to be held over the party's demands that Bulgaria should recognize Crimea's referendum and veto possible EU sanctions.

Mihail Mikov, Parliament Speaker, has repeatedly said that Bulgaria's Parliament could not be pushed to a joint position.

Distribution of party seats at the Bulgaria's Central Electoral Commission is also to be discussed, as center-right opposition GERB (Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria) warned over the weekend. Its leader Boyko Borisov declared he would broach the subject as his party was "deprived" of the position of deputy chair at plenary sessions in...