Bulgarian Prime Minister Sergey Stanishev announced Thursday that his country would pull out its entire military contingent in Iraq when its mandate expires at the end of the year.
"The presence of the Bulgarian military contingent on a humanitarian mission in Iraq ends on December 31. We have informed our partners in the US-led coalition of our decision. It was a very hard mission for our troops," Stanishev said at a press conference on Thursday.
The move to withdraw the troops from Iraq comes ahead of the parliamentary elections in Bulgaria by middle of 2009. Moreover, Stanishev had pledged to bring Bulgarian soldiers home in his election campaign in 2005.
"I can say as a leader of the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) that we have fulfilled our election promise", Stanishev said, adding that the "move is not an irresponsible act towards our partners."
Though Bulgaria had deployed more than 500 troops in Iraq in August 2003, it later downsized its troop levels in the war-torn country and moved them to a safer location. Currently, it has some 155 soldiers in Iraq, who are presently guarding a facility for the re-integration of convicts.
The Balkan country, which joined NATO in 2004 and the European Union in 2007, joined the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq in 2003, and has lost 13 soldiers and six civilians in the Iraq war so far.
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May 01, 2026 15:54 ET Central banks dominated the economics news flow this week with almost all major ones announcing their latest policy decisions and many boosted expectations for a rate hike in June. In other news, several countries released the preliminary data for first quarter economic growth. In the U.S., comments by Fed Chair Jerome Powell were also in focus as his term ends this month.