Bulgaria will continue its support for the European integration of Turkey because isolation is in nobody’s interest, said Dzhema Grozdanova, chair of the Foreign Affairs Parliamentary Committee for the Bulgarian news agency BTA. Dzhema Grozdanova is heading a delegation to Turkey.

At a meeting with the Bulgarian delegation in Ankara, the Turkish side expressed concern over the change of place names which are in the Turkish language in the region of Stara Zagora with place names in Bulgarian, over the problem of mufti property, and the restoration of Ottoman sites in Bulgaria. The Turkish side also insisted on the closure of two schools in Sofia, declared to be Gulenist. Turkey is also explicitly requesting that the joint committee on unresolved bilateral issues resumes its work. The committee held its last sitting in 2012. Another demand is that the unresolved issues be discussed at a lower level, and not by the Bulgaria-Turkey Strategic Cooperation Council.