EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT 2014 - 2019

Committee on Petitions

29.9.2014

NOTICE TO MEMBERS

Subject: Petition 1309/2013 by Emil Vaklinov (Bulgarian), on the free movement of people and goods between and

1. Summary of petition

The petitioner reports that it is difficult to reach various towns in the and that this means that real opportunities for business and investment are lost. Many people are leaving the area to seek work elsewhere. The petitioner believes that the crossing between and is polluted by vehicle exhaust fumes and that other crossing points should therefore be opened. The petitioner is calling for the right conditions to be created to enable people, goods and vehicles to cross the Rhodope Mountains between Bulgaria and Greece, for support to be given to small and medium-sized enterprises in the Rhodope Mountain border region, and for all the road infrastructure projects between the two countries to be finalised.

2. Admissibility

Declared admissible on 14 April 2014. Information requested from Commission under Rule 216(6).

3. Commission reply, received on 29 September 2014

The cross-border road connection between Zlatograd and Xanthi was opened in 2010 to facilitate the free movement of people between Greece and Bulgaria. The winding mountainous road is designed and opened for cars, small buses up to 15 passengers and cargo vans up to 3.5 tonnes. In order to mitigate the negative environmental impact of increased traffic, new traffic management, including the construction of new bridge and parking facilities was introduced in the town of Zlatograd with the financial support of Greece-

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EN United in diversity EN Bulgaria cross-border cooperation programme 2007-2013. Bulgaria and Greece share a long land border of 493 km, with very few crossing points, due to the specific mountainous character of the cross-border region. Despite recent development of the cross-border infrastructure in the East Rodope mountain area (Zlatograd-Xanthi connection opened in 2010, and the most recent -Nymphea connection built in 2013), the area is still hardly accessible. The area suffers from ageing and depopulation, phenomena commonly shared by most rural areas in Greece and Bulgaria. On the Second Meeting of the Bulgarian-Hellenic High Level Cooperation Council, held in Athens on 17th December 2012, the parties declared their firm commitment to work on the Elidje – section, which would provide high quality road connection between - -Xanthi, which is part of the TEN-T comprehensive network. The Bulgarian section of the road has been recently extended from Smolyan till the Elidje pass, which constitutes the border with Greece. The border check point at Elidje is not yet open. On the Greek side, preparatory works including the technical and feasibility studies are currently being carried out. With the completion of this new crossing route, accessibility would be improved, but the environmental impact of traffic would not be decreased, but only be relocated. Conclusion The European Structural and Investment Funds support the promotion of sustainable transport and removal of bottlenecks in key network infrastructure as well as strengthening the competitiveness of SMEs. It is however the responsibility of the Member States to translate the thematic objectives of ESIF into actions and deliver results. The Commission will propose to the national authorities of Bulgaria and Greece to discuss the issue of accessibility of the Rodope region during the negotiation of the 2014-2020 programmes. The Commission will also propose that the need to improve accessibility in the border region be taken into account during the elaboration of the strategy for the Greece- Bulgaria cross-border cooperation programme, which should aim to tackle common challenges identified jointly in the border regions, such as poor accessibility, job creation or outward migration. Due to the limitation in terms of available budget, the cross-border cooperation programmes can mainly support transport preparatory works and complement greater infrastructure projects with small-scale investments, traffic management tools and with the development of cross-border public transport services in order to promote labour mobility.

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