Four weeks ago in Brussels, Boiko Borisov and Silvio Berlusconi conferred on Bulgarian’s entry to the Euro zone, the future of Bulgaria’s nuclear power engineering and gas deliveries. Apparently, talks on the above subjects will continue further in Sofia in Thursday, both at the one-to-one conference between the two government leaders and the plenary sessions of the two delegations.

Otherwise, Mr. Berlusconi’s visit to Bulgaria will take place in the context of the 130^th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Italy and Bulgaria. In this connection the Bulgarian prime Minister and his Italian counterpart will validate a special anniversary postal stamp issue. In another development, the Bulgarian Prime Minister will be decorated with The Order of Merit of the Italian Republic. For his part, the Italian Prime Minister will be decorated with the Order of Stara Planina with ribbon.

Mr. Berlusconi’s visit to Bulgaria signals also that Bulgaria continues to be a strategically important economic partner to Italy. According to official statistics, Italy is expected to rank second in terms of Bulgaria’s trade turnover, despite the ongoing global financial and economic crisis. And yet, though not overly stated, Prime Minister Berlusconi is essentially interested in Bulgaria’s position on the” Southern Stream” gas pipeline. He will seek to find out, at close quarters, how the land lies and if need be influence the attitude of the new Bulgarian government to this energy project. We could recall here that Italy is a major player in” Southern Stream” via its ENI oil company, which partners with Russia’s Gazprom in the project. “Southern Stream” will estimatedly transit over 63 billion cubic metres of gas annually from Russia to Italy through Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia.

The affairs of the Italian ENEL energy company will form another focus to Mr. Berlusconi’s visit. ENEL has been involved in the last few years in upgrading Maritsa East 3 Thermo-Power Plant. With Nuclear Power Plants re-emerging on Italy’s agenda, ENEL doesn’t seem overly keen on having a slice in Bulgaria’s nuclear power engineering pie. It would like though to have a leading part in renewable energy sources in Bulgaria. The first ENEL-made wind park was commissioned recently in the environs of Kavarna on the Black Sea.

And last but not least, Italy’s Prime Minister is paying a visit abroad at a rather difficult point for him in domestic terms. The Italian Court of Cassation stripped him recently of his Prime Ministerial immunity and he is due to appear in court on charges of conflict of interests.