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President Bush Meets with Prime Minister Stanishev of Bulgaria
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For Immediate Release Office of the Press Secretary June 18, 2008

President Bush Meets with Prime Minister Stanishev of Bulgaria Oval Office

˙ /news/releases/2008/06/20080618-5.wm.v.html ˙˙Presidential Remarks
˙˙Audio


11:48 A.M. EDT

PRESIDENT BUSH: Mr. Prime Minister, welcome to the Oval Office. It was
about a year ago that I had the great pleasure of visiting your beautiful
country, and I want to thank you for the warm hospitality you showed and
thank you for giving me a chance to welcome you here to the Oval Office. We
had a very extensive conversation --

PRIME MINISTER STANISHEV: Indeed.

PRESIDENT BUSH: -- and that's what you'd expect among friends.

First, I want to congratulate you and thank you and your government for the
role you have played in the Western Balkans. You've been a constructive
force for stability, a constructive force for hope. You've projected a
hopeful future and -- for the people in Kosovo and Serbia. And I want to
thank you for that. It's really important that there be leadership in the
neighborhood, and you've provided it.

Secondly, I want to thank you very much for your nation's strong
contributions to helping others realize the blessings of liberty, whether
it be in Afghanistan or Iraq. I fully understand how difficult these issues
can be. On the other hand, you understand how hopeful the world can be when
people live in free societies. So I want to thank you and I want to thank
the people of your country for the sacrifices that you have made.

Thirdly, we talked about a mutual concern, and that's energy: How do we get
more energy on the market; how do we help others, our respective countries
and others, realize the blessings of additional energy supply? I mean,
we're in a world that is -- where supply has exceeded -- where demand has
exceeded supply. There's high prices. Both our countries -- the people in
our countries are wondering what do we intend to do about it.

And so we had a good discussion about the diversification of energy supply.
I really appreciate the Prime Minister's discussion about nuclear power.
Prime Minister, we're trying to expand nuclear power here in the United
States of America because it's clean, it's renewable, and it will help us
become less dependent on hydrocarbons.

We talked about two other issues that are of importance to the Prime
Minister and the people of his country. First, we talked about visas. I
fully understand the concerns of your people when it comes to visas. On the
one -- we're helping, we're part of a very important coalition; we're
allies, and yet we don't get treated the same as other people within the
EU.

PRIME MINISTER STANISHEV: It was a good breakthrough.

PRESIDENT BUSH: And today because of the Prime Minister's hard work, there
has been a breakthrough on the visa waiver, as an important step toward
achieving the same status as other countries in the EU. And I want to
congratulate you on that. Thank you for your hard work and thank you for
your care about the people of your country.

Finally, I applauded the Prime Minister for his and his government's work
on dealing with corruption. I reminded the Prime Minister that all of us
have got a responsibility to deal with corruption. When we find corrupt
officials in the United States, we expect them to be, within the rule of
law, be dealt with. And that's what you're doing. And the people who
ultimately benefit from that decision are the people of your country. They
-- I know they appreciate your tough stand. Nobody wants to have a
government where it looks like a few benefit at the cost of many.

And so your tough stance have made a big difference. I'm proud that you're
here. I want to thank you for it. You're a good, young, strong leader, and
that's said from an old guy. Welcome.

PRIME MINISTER STANISHEV: Thank you. Well, thank you, Mr. President, for
the good words about Bulgaria, indeed. And my assessment is that our
relations have reached the level of strategic partnership. And I see no
contradiction in this with our good behavior and our contributions to the
European Union.

PRESIDENT BUSH: That's right.

PRIME MINISTER STANISHEV: I think Bulgaria proved in the last several years
that we can be good contributors of stability for NATO, we can be active in
the European Union, and we can develop our excellent relations with the
United States -- because it is amazing that in 18 years, our countries have
reached this level of trust, confidence. And from this point of view, I
appreciate your very strong leadership role in the support of the reform
process in Bulgaria.

It is never easy. It requires a lot of efforts, persistence. Results do not
always come overnight. But they develop, and everyone who comes to Bulgaria
after several years of absence is saying the country has made great
progress. And the United States have always been very helpful in this
process.

I must say that we see our role in the region as a country which is
bridging and guaranteeing stability both for the Western Balkans and for
the broader Black Sea area, which are very important, because without
stability in the Balkans, without European perspective and NATO perspective
for these countries, we cannot speak about real prosperity and democracy in
the region. The region has many wounds from the war in former Yugoslavia,
and they have to be healed. And the international presence is very
important, and the European perspective, as well.

And we also see the importance of the Black Sea area, both politically,
from the point of view of security issues and from the point of view of
energy issues. And I appreciate the dialogue which we had on
diversification of energy supply, on nuclear energy. Bulgaria will be
developing our nuclear facilities, not only the new ones, but there are
many other projects where American companies can participate in nuclear
issues, but also in thermal power plants, many other energy projects,
because we want to be indeed a hub of energy stability in the region. We
want to be enough independent; we want to be exporter of energy.

We are good partners in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in Kosovo. And Bulgaria
really is not simply a beneficiary of our membership in NATO or the
European Union, but we are a contributor, because we know our
responsibilities and we shall not give up on these responsibilities because
there are many challenges around the world. We have to overcome them
together with our friends and partners.

I thank you very much for this support and for the American experts who
worked on this declaration on visa waiver. You, Mr. President, were the
first to say that this is not a normal situation, when two nations have
such confidence, when we have 200,000 Bulgarians living in the United
States, more and more Americans coming to Bulgaria, to have this obstacle
for normal human contacts. There is a way to go. There is work to do. But
we shall do it together, and I believe that the sooner we achieve -- make
our business, the better for the citizens of our two countries.

And finally, thank you also for the supporting the reforms in the fight
against organized crime and corruption. Bulgaria is a nation which became
member of the European Union, which is modernizing. Our economic growth is
excellent. Our performances in economy are good. And we see the reform in
the fight against organized crime and corruption, the judiciary reform, as
a very important further precondition for our economic growth, and for the
development of the nation.

And I remember that last year you supported the establishment of the new
State Agency for National Security. I can say with satisfaction that it is
already operational, it works excellently with American services, and it
has operations which are bringing concrete fruits. But there is work to do.

PRESIDENT BUSH: Thank you for coming.

PRIME MINISTER STANISHEV: Thank you, Mr. President.

PRESIDENT BUSH: Thank you all.

END 11:57 A.M. EDT

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