News archive of June 2020

The amendments to the act were recently approved on a first reading. They were introduced by the nationalist Vice-Prime Minister, Valery Simeonov and former Ecology Minister Neno Dimov before his resignation and arrest, with the blessing of the Minister of Environment, Emil Dimitrov.

Wizz Air announced today the distribution of the 3rd aircraft to its base in Varna. The new Airbus A320 will join the flotilla on July 24, 2020, which will make it possible to launch 8 new routes from Varna to Athens, Barcelona, ​​Brussels, Salzburg, Frankfurt, Nuremberg, Karlsruhe / Baden-Baden and Hanover.

Turkey has granted $5 million to Palestine to fight the novel coronavirus outbreak, according to a ruling published in the Official Gazette on June 26. 

The agreement on providing a financial contribution to Palestine amid pandemic was signed on June 11 in the Turkish capital city of Ankara with Palestinian envoy to Turkey Faed Mustafa.

Before the meeting with the Serbian President, which started at around 9 am at the headquarters of the European Commission in Brussels, von der Leyen assessed that this would be an important opportunity to discuss reforms on the EU path and the long-term recovery of the region.

Turkey has responded to the United States' envoy for religious freedom, Sam Brownback, who called on the Turkish government to maintain the status of the Hagia Sophia as a museum and stressed that it is an active contributor to the preservation of 18 world heritage sites.

Legislative work in the Turkish Parliament has been suspended until June 30 after an increase in coronavirus cases on its premises.
On June 24, seven new COVID-19 cases were confirmed in parliament including one technician at its hospital, an official at the press office and some staff working in the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) working for group chair Naci Bostancı.

Serbian Orthodox Church protests in Podgorica, Montenegro. Photo: BIRN/Samir Kajosevic

On Thursday, the National Coordination Body for Infectious Diseases announced that open-air religious gatherings would be prohibited unless they took place on church premises. The same body also banned political gatherings in open spaces.

Limited curfews across the country will be imposed in Turkey on June 27 and June 28 when university admission exams are held.
Earlier in June, a limited curfew was imposed in all provinces as eighth-graders took the High School Transition System (LGS) exam on June 20.

Irregular arrivals from Turkey to European Union countries were 94 percent lower than before a key migrant agreement Ankara and Brussels sealed four years ago , and a total of about 27,000 Syrian refugees have been resettled from Turkey to European countries, new data from the European Asylum Support Office (EASO) have shown.

The Turkish Foreign Ministry has criticized the "Country Reports on Terrorism 2019" of the U.S. State Department for "being negligent" regarding the role of FETÖ in a July 2016 coup attempt.