European Commission approves third RRF disbursement for Bulgaria

The European Commission (EC) announced that it is providing Bulgaria with €1.465 billion from the third disbursement under its national Recovery and Resilience Plan.

In response to a query from BTA, the EC stated that it adopted a partially positive assessment of Bulgaria’s request for the third disbursement under the Recovery and Resilience Plan, CE Report quotes FENA.

The Commission found that Bulgaria had successfully completed 48 out of 50 key milestones linked to the third payment request, but also noted that key milestone 220, concerning the establishment and operational start of the anti-corruption body, and part of key milestone 222, relating to criminal procedure legislation and the accountability and criminal liability of the chief prosecutor, were not satisfactorily fulfilled at this stage.

As a result, the Commission proposed a temporary postponement of part of the total amount of the third disbursement in accordance with the Recovery and Resilience Facility Regulation, the EC told BTA.

After receiving the opinion of the Council’s Economic and Financial Committee and Bulgaria’s response to the preliminary assessment, the EC on 22 December adopted an official decision on a partial third payment of €1.465 billion, while temporarily withholding €152.896 million.

Bulgaria has six months to take measures and complete the remaining reforms linked to the third disbursement.

Bulgaria submitted its third request for payment under the EU Recovery and Resilience Instrument on 1 October 2025, with a total requested amount of €1.619 billion.

The main measures concern continuing reforms in areas such as research and innovation, decarbonization, improving governance frameworks for state-owned enterprises, and the development of e-health.

Foto/ Arhiv