22 tons of yellow cheese (kashkaval) past its sell-by date have been delivered to an incineration plant by the Bulgarian Food Safety Agency (BABH).

Laboratory tests have confirmed that the dairy product is unfit for consumption due to the advanced stages of milk fat oxidation, according to BABH’s statement.

The yellow cheese is owned by the Bulgarian State Agency State Reserve and War-time Stocks which the government ordered closed in early November.

Finance Minister Simeon Djkankov explained the step with the fact that the state agency had a staff of 600 and its shutdown would save an estimated BGN 80-90 M.

Under the changes, peacetime reserves are to be transferred to the Interior Ministry and war-time stocks to the Defense Ministry and an Executive Agency for Oil and Oil Products with a total headcount of 39 is to be established at the Transport Ministry.

BABH did not disclose further details about the spoiled food.

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Plovdiv, Bulgaria‘s second largest city, is in the focus of the festivities in the country as it celebrates the 126th anniversary since its unification.

A solemn retreat starting 20:30 local time on Tuesday will be the culmination of the celebrations in the city, the bTV private channel has informed. The holiday is also marked with events all across the country.

Bulgaria‘s President Georgi Parvanov and Parliamentary Speaker Tsetska Tsacheva are present at the event.

On September 6, 1885, the Principality of Bulgaria unified with the autonomous Ottoman province of Eastern Roumelia, a few years after its liberation from Ottoman yoke.

The historic proclamation was made after a march by a handful of Bulgarians from the small town of Saedinenie  (“Unification“) to the town of Plovdiv, removing one of the gravest injustices imposed in the wake of the Berlin Congress. The Unification was prepared by a network of secret revolutionary committees in Eastern Roumelia, and was backed by the then Bulgarian ruler, Knyaz (King) Alexander I Batenberg.

Great Britain had been the primary protagonist in downsizing Bulgaria during the Berlin Congress because it feared a large Bulgarian state with access to the Mediterranean would be under Russian influence. However, in 1885-1886, it backed informally but rather noticeably, Bulgaria‘s Unification, seeing that the Russian Empire at the time was against this move, which stirred diplomatic tension in the Balkans, and seized the chance to demolish Russian influence in Bulgaria.

As other Balkan countries objected to Bulgaria‘s Unification, Serbia attacked Bulgaria in November 1885. In a grand national effort to defend the Unification, the young Bulgarian Army, which had just been left by its senior Russian officers, repulsed the attack, and defeated the Serbs on their territory, thus making the Unification of Northern and Southern Bulgaria a fait accompli.

But it was not until 1886 when the Great Powers recognized the almost doubled state of Bulgaria with a Bulgarian-Ottoman treaty.

After the Unification of 1885, Bulgarian efforts were focused on making Macedonia and the rest of Thrace part of the country. Thus, Bulgaria backed the VMORO (Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization) and its staging of the failed Ilinden-Preobrazhenia Uprising in 1903, and subsequently took part in the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913, World War I (1915-1918) and World War II (1941-1945).

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A total of nine bodies have been discovered since the Russian “Bulgaria” boat sank Sunday, with local authorities claiming there is little chance for survivors to be found.

A total of 80 people have been rescued, but scores are still missing after the two-deck river cruiser sank in the Volga river.

Chances that any survivors may be found are decreasing, Emergency Situations Ministry spokeswoman Irina Andrianova has said, according to the Daily News Engine.

There were more than 170 people on board of the riverboat, including at least 30 children. The “Bulgaria” boat sank in the middle of the river in the Volga region near the village of Syukeyevo in the Kansko-Ustinovsky district of the Republic of Tatarstan on Sunday afternoon.

The double-deck ship was built in Czechoslovakia in 1955 and is designed for 140 passengers, according to the site of the company that owns it.

An earthquake with a magnitude of 3.3 on the Richter scale was registered in Southeastern Bulgaria Wednesday afternoon.

The earthquake hit at 4:32 pm local time; it did not produce any damages or injuries.

Its epicenter was located 40 km west of the city of Burgas and 7 km south of the town of Karnobat, at a depth of 2 km, according to the European Seismology Center.

Southeastern Bulgaria has seen a number of mild earthquakes in the past few weeks.

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Bulgaria’s capital will host Saturday the fourth edition of  Sofia Pride, a march for equal rights of persons of different sexual orientation or gender identity.

Over 1000 participants are expected to attend the demonstration celebrating lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) culture.

The gathering point for Sofia Pride 2011 is the Lovers’ bridge right behind the National Palace of Culture (NDK). The event will start at 16:00 and last until 17:30, covering the following route- Lovers ‘Bridge (NDK) – Fridtjof Nansen Str- Vasil Levski Blvd – Tsar Osvoboditel Blvd- Soviet Army monument.

To ensure a clear passage for the demonstration, the traffic along the planned route will be intermittently restricted.

“The Pride is not a demonstration of sexuality. The Pride is an element of the fight for the unhampered expression of every type of sexual orientation. The Pride is the visible part of the battle against people being murdered, beaten to death, insulted, mocked, dismissed, chased away from home or suppressed because of who they love”, the organizers of the event claim.

Like the previous three editions of the event, Sofia Pride 2011 will also take place under enhanced security measures.

In the meantime, the Sofia municipality rejected a call of an anti-LGBT organization to hold a parallel rally, with Deputy Mayor for Security Ivan Sotirov saying that such a march would only be permitted at a different place and time.

Sofia Pride 2011 has so far been backed by the embassies of the USA, Netherlands, Belgium, UK, Germany, Slovenia, Finland and Norway, Austria, France and Switzerland and a number of non-governmental organizations.

Bulgaria’s Supreme Judicial Council (VSS) has rejected the proposal of Sofia City prosecutor Nikolay Kokinov for awarding four of his subordinates, who had worked on key trials.

Kokinov has proposed prosecutors Roman Vasilev, Bozhidar Dzhambazov, Margarita Nemska and Neli Zlatkova to be awarded with a diploma for their good work on two of the key trials in Bulgaria, which resulted in effective sentences and which were noted in the latest report by Brussels.

“I do not understand the reason for awarding these prosecutors. What work have they done besides the ordinary work of every magistrate?,” asked Kapka Kostova, VSS member.

She also expressed concern that Vasilev should not be awarded months after he was sanctioned for inappropriate behavior during the arrest of former Defense Minister Nikolay Tsonev.

However, Bulgaria’s Chief Prosecuto, Boris Velchev, did not agree that someone who had been punished for one thing cannot be awarded for a different thing.

“But at the same time I share Kostova’s concerns. I understand the Sofia City prosecutor who wants to encourage the efforts for giving effective sentences, but I think that they should first come into force,” Velchev said.

The Chair of the Supreme Judicial Council, Lazar Gruev, advised Kokinov to not focus only on prosecutors who work on cases of public interest, but also on others who are outside of the media spotlight.

The VSS concluded that the Sofia City prosecutor should either withdraw his proposal for awarding Vasilev, Dzhambazov, Nemska and Zlatkova, or should submit it again with more clear and detailed motives.

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A 2-year old girl passed away Friday at the 7th hospital in the Bulgarian capital Sofia while waiting on an ambulance.

The news was reported Saturday by the Bulgarian National Television, BNT.

Anastasiya has been brought to the hospital by her parent for an exam. The girl died inside the doctor’s office. The initial diagnosis is acute respiratory insufficiency.

The parents are blaming Emergency Services for delaying by half hour the ambulance the doctor requested.

The Head of the Emergency Services, Dr. Georgi Gelev, denies there has been a delay. The call about a dying child has been placed on the emergency 112 hotline at 4:35 pm; the ambulance left at 4:37 pm and arrived at the hospital at 4:42 pm only to find out the toddler had already passed away, Gelev insists.

A second call for another ambulance has been placed through a stationary phone at the hospital, but this ambulance has been cancelled at the 2nd minute.

An investigation in the case and autopsy results are pending.

Hadzhi was elected unanimously by the votes of all attending delegates and said he was hoping the Bulgarian Court will, this time, take under account the will of Bulgarian Muslims and is going to register him as Chief Mufti.

Since the spring of 2010, a large number of the country’s Muslims have organized many protests against a court ruling to restore to the position of Chief Mufti Nedim Gendzhev, a man who held the office in the past but whom the protesters accuse of various violations such as embezzlement.

Gendnzhev does not see the conference as legitimate and threatens to call the Supreme Muslim Council, which he chairs per the Court’s rule.

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