Garmen

The demolition of the illegal residential buildings in Garmen has now been completed, as reported by Focus information agency.

A total of four buildings have been removed from the site out of all 124. They were all demolished using a bulldozer and the Roma people in the neighborhood tore down another house by themselves.

Bulgarian Interior Minister Rumyana Bachvarova has said her ministry is starting a program to hire more employees of ethnic Roma origin.

This comes after weeks of tensions between Bulgarian and Roma residents of the village of Garmen, in the country's southwest, and more recently in the Orlandovtsi neighborhood of the capital Sofia.

More than BGN 110 M, or EUR 55 M, of funding earmarked for Bulgaria under the 2014-2020 operational programs are to be set aside for Roma integration, a EU official has said.

"The money is available now, could be used outright and the work [done with it] has to be complex," according to EU Commission Vice President for Budget and Human Resources Kristalina Georgieva.

Roma people in the Bulgarian village of Garmen have not yet started to remove buildings erected illegally in the Kremikovtsi neighborhood,  officials say.

According to the Ministry of Regional Development, all buildings have remained intact since mid-May when tensions started to build up in the southwestern Bulgarian village.

Merely a day prior to the mass protest to be held in Garmen in opposition to illegal Roma buildings in the region, Roma people will get the chance to purchase their homes from the municipality.

Starting Monday, each and every person residing in the minority neighborhood will be able to purchase their piece of land at a price of BGN 1,10 per square meter.

Only 24 houses in the Roma neighborhood of Kremikovtsi in the southwestern village of Garmen are legal, according to the results of joint inspections of power distributor CEZ, Bugaria's National Construction Control Directorate, and the Social Assistance Directorate.

The Roma population in the Garmen municipality have stated their conviction that they are living in peace and harmony with the rest of the citizens in the region. They commented on the tensions in the neighborhood of Kremikovtsi.

The residents of the Bulgarian village of Garmen held a peaceful protest on Tuesday against the illegal buildings in the Roma neighbourhood.

The citizens also declared themselves against the thefts, which have become more frequent in the region, private NOVA TV reports.

''Come again in a week's time,'' called on the citizens of Garmen to Bulgarian Interior Minister Rumyana Bachvarova.

Bulgaria's Interior Ministry will try to defuse tensions in the village of Garmen, which escalated over the weekend.