Bulgaria’s ‘We Continue the Change’ join liberal Renew

Two MEPs from Bulgaria’s “We Continue the Change (PP)” party have been accepted as full members of the Renew Europe parliamentary group, the party announced on Wednesday.

“By accepting them as members of the parliamentary group, the PP stands in a liberal family with Mark Rutte, Emmanuel Macron and Kaja Kallas,” the party said in its statement. It raises the number of Renew Europe group MEPs from Bulgaria to five.

Former parliamentary Speaker Nikola Minchev and Bulgarian rapper Hristo Petrov, aka Hazarta, are joining Renew. However, their national party has clarified that this membership is independent of the party’s ALDE membership, where the Turkish minority party Movement for Rights and Freedoms (DPS) is one of the leading parties.

The leader of DPS is Delyan Peevski, who was sanctioned for corruption by the US under the Global Magnitsky Act.

“Nikola Minchev and Hristo Petrov become members of Renew Europe as independent MPs, in the same way French President Emmanuel Macron’s deputies are members of the political family,” the PP announced.

The coalition We Continue the Change—Democratic Bulgaria won three MEP seats in the EU elections. Radan Kanev, the third MEP, will join the European People’s Party group as Bulgaria’s sixth MEP.

Two MEPs set to join the Socialists & Democrats group, one from populist “There is Such a People” potentially to join the European Conservatives and Reformists Group, and three from far-right and pro-Russian Vazrazhdane (Revival), who were the first to publicly talk about creating a far-right ‘Sovereignists’ parliamentary grouping together with far-right Alternative for Germany, complete the list.

(Krassen Nikolov | Euractiv.bg)

Read more with Euractiv