Ministry of Defence

Bulgarian Health Minister Nikolay Petrov has resigned, the government press service announced, one day after an investigation on BTV, one of Bulgaria's main TV channels, revealed that as a head of the Military Medical Academy - a position he occupied before becoming a minister - Petrov signed contracts for 1.6 million leva [around 600,000 euros] for medical items with a company owned by the par

Bulgaria plans to spend 4.4 billion levs ($2.64 billion/2.25 billion euro) on defence and security next year, figures from the 2018 draft budget proposed by the finance ministry showed on Monday.

The planned expenditure represents 4.2% of the gross domestic product (GDP) projected for 2018, the ministry said in a statement.

BELGRADE - Serbia and Russia are carefully building and maintaining special relations, Serbian and Russian Defence Ministers Aleksandar Vulin and Sergey Shoygu agreed at a meeting in Belgrade on Friday.

Vulin and Shoygu - who is in Belgrade for the city's WWII Liberation Day commemorations - met in the old army general staff building.

BELGRADE - Serbian Defence Minister Aleksandar Vulin met on Thursday with Michail Kostarakos, chairman of the European Union Military Committee.

Serbia's foreign policy goal is to maintain the status of a militarily neutral country, the Ministry of Defence said in a statement.

Thousands of citizens will be in Batajnica on Friday for the Belgrade Liberation Day military parade.

And the highest-ranking foreign guest will be Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

At the regular meeting of the Council of Ministers will be discussed the way of security of the airspace of Bulgaria, reported BGNES.

The strengthening of the security of the airspace of the Republic of Bulgaria will be discussed by jointly accomplishing tasks of the Bulgarian Air Force with the forces of the Italian Republic and determining the limitations of their joint actions.

Experienced officers who were trained and started a career with the former Yugoslav People's Army, the JNA, could now be retired in the wake of Montenegro becoming a NATO member in June.

MOSCOW - Pilots of the Serbian Air Force and Air Defence and the Russian Aerospace Defence Forces on Wednesday kicked off BARS 2017, their third joint flight and tactical exercise.

This year, BARS is held at the Lipetsk-2 airport in the city of Lipetsk, 500 km southeast of Moscow, the Serbian Ministry of Defence said in a statement.

Wikimedia photo

Romania's two-month-old Social Democrat-led government had its first reshuffle on Tuesday, with the ruling party appointing new defence and economy ministers.

Mihai Fifor, 43, is set to take over the defence portfolio after the resignation of his predecessor, Adrian Tutuianu, who quit two weeks ago over the lack of funds to pay military salaries on time in September.

Serbian Defense Minister Aleksandar Vulin will start his two-day visit to Russia on Friday, Beta is reporting.

Vulin will meet with his Russian counterpart Sergei Shoigu and attend the final part of International Army Games at the Alabino Range near the capital.