Rosen Plevneliev

Bulgaria's new President Rumen Radev will include secretaries on issues such as anti-corruption, the rotating EU presidency due next year, spirituality and culture, and science, his press office says.

The EU Presidency portfolio was not part of the team of Rosen Plevneliev, who formally left the office on Sunday.

"I will have a new workplace" in the short term, Bulgarian Vice President Margarita Popova has said at her farewell press conference with President Rosen Plevneliev.

Popova's comment comes in response to a journalist's question whether she received an invitation to the caretaker cabinet due to be appointed by President-elect Rumen Radev.

Outgoing Bulgarian President Rosen Plevneliev has argued Bulgaria may be stripped of its Council of the European Union presidency if it works toward division within the EU.

In his farewell press conference alongside Vice President Margarita Popova, he has said such a move is one of the "big risks" facing the country in the months to come, a step that would be "a shame" on Bulgaria.

Several days of handing the Presidency over to Rumen Radev from Rosen Plevneliev are coming until the end of the week.

The end of Plevneliev's tenure symbolically begins with his last press conference on Wednesday morning where he will summarize the five years of holding the office.

President Rosen Plevneliev on Tuesday awarded Spain's outgoing Ambassador to Bulgaria Jose Luis Tapia Vicente with a Stara Planina order (Order of the Balkan Mountains).

Plevneliev hailed his work not only as an envoy to Bulgaria, but during the years when Bulgarian medics were held imprisoned in Libya until 2007.

President Rosen Plevneliev and Vice President Margarita Popova will give their last press conference while in office on Wednesday.

The two will give their account on the achievements of five years in office, days before Rumen Radev and Iliana Iotova take over as President and Vice President.

Bulgaria should work to seize the new and imminent wave of integration and avoid sliding toward nationalism, outgoing President Rosen Plevneliev has told politicians and businesses.

Bulgarian President Rosen Plevneliev has acknowledged there has been a "problem" between him and the Vice President, Margarita Popova.

"We have not met in a year," he has added.

Regardless of tense relations, however, the two "managed to preserve the institution", he has argued, in an interview with NOVA TV station ten days before leaving office.

Bulgaria's sitting President Rosen Plevneliev has said he doesn't want the country to be brought back to the 19th century when it fell victim to great power drawing up spheres of influence.

Bulgaria's President Rosen Plevneliev is the only sitting head of state to sign a letter to US President-elect Donal Trump advising him against rapprochement with Russia.