EU cancels aid to Bulgaria

The EU Commission has cancelled 220 million euros in aid to Bulgaria due to the country's rampant corruption. Dnevnik newspaper shows understanding for the decision: "The announcement and subsequent comments by Olli Rehn, Commissioner for EU Enlargement, have surprised the government, whose members went on blithely claiming the opposite - namely that the aid money would not be lost - to the end. The government was faced with the impossible task of maintaining the status quo while reporting that progress was underway. ... Problems over the EU funds were attributed merely to allegedly poor communication between Brussels and Sofia. Now this excuse can no longer be used. Commissioner Oli Rehn has stated clearly that the problem does not lie in communication, but in Sofia's failure to act. And because someone in this situation had to make the first move, the EU Commission was finally the one to do so."

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