Bulgarian Foreign Minister Daniel Mitov has spent almost the whole week in Southeast Asia paying official visits to Malaysia and Indonesia. The tour is impressive above all with the fact that a Bulgarian foreign minister had never visited Malaysia, and as to Indonesia, this has been the first such visit since 1965. For average Bulgarians the two countries are mostly exotic destinations however in political and economic terms things look different. Both Malaysia and Indonesia are important economic partners of the European Union and this impacts on Bulgaria too, being the bloc’s member.

However, during Minister Mitov’s talks in Kuala Lumpur a clear point was made that relations could expand also within the Asia-Europe Meeting and other multi-country formats. Bulgaria would hail Malaysian investments in its economy, and can offer foods and machine-building products. The signature of a bilateral memo for cooperation in legal matters is aimed to promote exchange of legislative information and of legal professionals.

It is worth noting that the visit of the Bulgarian foreign minister to Indonesia was preceded by working contacts at the level of the ministries of economy and agriculture. Commodity exchange with that country is modest – to the tune of about one hundred million dollars annually, but it is encouraging given that it shows a trend for tangible growth. Bulgaria tries to attract trade flows from Indonesia to EU through its Black Sea ports and can offer to the market in that country wine, yoghurt, dairy products, essential oils, wheat, meat, seeds, tobacco, electronic parts, machinery and more.

Overall, relations with Malaysia and Indonesiaare favored not only by Bulgaria’s membership of EU but also by the two countries’ membership of ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations). EU is the second biggest foreign trade partner of ASEAN after China with trade turnover close to 200 billion euro. This is a precondition for progress of both economic and political relations. The revival of relations with Malaysia and Indonesia takes place in a favorable international environment, so we are likely to see important developments soon.

English Daniela Konstantinova