Provinces of Bulgaria

Specialists from Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein will familiarise themselves with the history of the ancient Thracian city of Perperikon near the Bulgarian town of Kardzhali.

This will be done within the framework of the "Perperikon - past and future" project, which will be realised next year.

The one-lev note will cease to be a legal tender in Bulgaria from next year, according to a decision of the country's central bank.

According to Tourism Minister Nikolina Angelkova, there was high likelihood that 1.2 million tourists could visit Bulgaria during the forthcoming winter season.

Angelkova said this in an interview for private NOVA TV on Friday, a day before the opening of the winter season.

Many people gathered in the town of Septemvri on Wednesday to celebrate with a special folklore programme the 70th anniversary of the only operating narrow-gauge railway in Bulgaria.

Bulgaria's only operating narrow-gauge railway runs between Septemvri and the town of Dobrinishte, which is located near the ski resort of Bansko.

Bulgarian ski resorts will keep prices unchanged from last year for Winter 2015-16, bTV reported on Friday, citing information from hotel owners and ski lift operators in Bansko, Pamporovo and Borovets.

Bulgaria is ready to allocate state budget funding for several sports events in 2016, including a tournament from the ATP World Tour 250 series in February, Sports Minister Krasen Kralev has said.

The dead bodies of five migrants, including two babies, have washed ashore in the northwestern Turkish province of Çanakkale amid ongoing failed attempts by migrants to cross into Greece.

Vitosha Boulevard in Bulgaria's capital Sofia ranks 54th among the 65 most expensive retail locations in the world, according to Cushman & Wakefield's 2015/2016 report Main Streets Across the World.

With its EUR 528 per square meter (sq.m.) annual rent, Vitosha Boulevard goes down two positions compared to the 2014/2015 edition of the report.

The numerous Thracian gold treasures, which have been excavated in Bulgaria over the years, have unleashed a gold rush in the country.

In the past years, more and more Bulgarians have started searching the country's rivers for specks of the precious metal, a recent article by AFP claims.

A Bulgarian hunting party captured fifty illegal immigrants near the country's border with Turkey over the weekend.

The party, which numbered 19 men, set out from the village of Evrenozovo near the town of Malko Tarnovo on Saturday to hunt game.

The hunters had been walking for hours into the forest when they heard a loud conversation near the border, private NOVA TV informs.