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PenzaNews. Bulgaria’s presidential and parliamentary elections have drawn a line under the rule of Prime Minister Boyko Borissov, who has led the country’s government almost permanently since 2009. Photo: Parliament.bg The incumbent President Rumen Radev, who won the second round, will remain in office for another five years. The majority of the seats in parliament went to anti-government parties. For example, We Continue the Change coalition headed by Kiril Petkov and Assen Vassilev became the leader of the race with 25.67% of votes. The party received 67 mandates in the People’s Assembly. The Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria (GERB) in coalition with the Union of Democratic Forces (UDF) was in second with 22,74% of votes and got 59 seats. They are followed by the Movement for Rights and Freedoms with 13% of votes and 34 mandates. The new parliament also includes the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP), which received 10.21% of votes (26 seats), There is Such a People party wi

PenzaNews. The meeting between US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping that took place in video format in mid-November, was the first since the inauguration of the American head of state in January 2021. Prior to this, the two leaders exchanged messages and phone calls. Photo: CGTN Joe Biden and his team gathered in the White House conference room (Roosevelt Room) when it was Monday evening, November 15 in Washington. Xi Jinping was in one of the rooms of the Great Hall of the People in Beijing – it was already Tuesday morning in the capital of China. In total, the negotiations lasted about three hours and a half. During the open part of the meeting, Joe Biden said that the leaders’ task is to ensure that competition does not veer into conflict and expressed the hope for a convergence of positions on issues of “honest competition” and “common-sense guardrails.” Xi Jinping, in turn, stressed that humanity is facing many problems, so “the United States and China need to i

PenzaNews.  From November 1, Russia has suspended the work of its official mission to NATO in Brussels, and also terminated the activities of two NATO structures in Moscow – a military liaison mission and an information bureau established at the Belgian embassy.  Photo: Jim Garamone, Wikipedia.org This decision was made by the Russian authorities in response to the unfriendly policy of the North Atlantic Alliance towards Moscow. On October 6, NATO announced a reduction in the number of the Russian mission in the organization from 20 to 10 people: eight diplomats had their accreditation revoked, and two more vacancies were abolished. The alliance asked Russian diplomats to leave Brussels until the end of October. At the same time, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that the decision to expel diplomats was not related to specific events. “This decision is not linked to any particular event, but we have seen over some time now, an increase in Russian malign activity, and therefo

PenzaNews.  The Welsh Government has established the Independent Commission on the Constitutional Future of Wales, which will consider the issue of the region’s independence in the context of future relations with the rest of the United Kingdom.  Photo: Graeme Maclean, Wikipedia.org According to the message published on the Cabinet website on October 19, the Commission will be co-chaired by Professor Laura McAllister and former Archbishop Rowan Williams and will consider and develop options for “fundamental reform of the constitutional structures of the United Kingdom, in which Wales remains an integral part and all progressive principal options to strengthen Welsh democracy and deliver improvements for the people of Wales.” At the same time, Laura McAllister stated that everything is supposed to be on the table. “So it would be ludicrous to remove any options at this stage. Independence means different things depending on different contexts,” she said. The Commission was created on th

PenzaNews. The next EU-Ukraine summit held in Kiev did not bring any breakthrough results. Its most significant outcome is considered to be the signing of the agreement on the Common Aviation Area, on Ukraine’s participation in the Horizon Europe research and innovation program, as well as in the Creative Europe program.  Photo: President.gov.ua Speaking of the EU membership, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky noted that Ukrainian society does not have a sufficient understanding of when the country will reach the home stretch in the process of European integration. “Our society [...] and the leaders of the country lack the understanding that we are following the same path, about where the finish line on this path is and whether there is one, because we really believe in it and do everything along the way, we do everything to come to that finish in the near future,” he said after the talks at the summit. Meanwhile, in Europe, criticism is increasingly heard in connection with the lo

PenzaNews.  The creation of AUKUS – a new security partnership between Australia, Great Britain and the United States, which led to the breakdown of the defense contract between Canberra and Paris for the supply of 12 Barracuda-class attack submarines totaling more than 50 billion euros, received mixed assessments.  Photo: U.S. Navy, Wikipedia.org As part of the agreement, Australia plans to build at least 8 nuclear submarines using American technology, as well as re-equip its armed forces with American cruise missiles. In Paris, Australia’s decision was called a “stab in the back” and betraying. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian noted that the start of trilateral cooperation on nuclear submarines “gravely undermines regional peace and stability, aggravates arms race and impairs international nuclear non-proliferation efforts.” According to Christoph Heusgen, a former German ambassador to the UN, the emergence of the new alliance has led to a “big loss of trust” in the Bid

PenzaNews. Experts continue to discuss the statement by US President Joseph Biden on the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan and the end of the era of major military operations to remake other countries. Photo: YouTube.com, CNBC Television In his speech, the head of the White House noted that the country turns the page on the foreign policy that has guided the nation the last two decades, and said that the US has to learn lessons from its mistakes. “To me, there are two that are paramount.  First, we must set missions with clear, achievable goals — not ones we’ll never reach. And second, we must stay clearly focused on the fundamental national security interest of the United States of America,” Joseph Biden said. “This decision about Afghanistan is not just about Afghanistan.  It’s about ending an era of major military operations to remake other countries,” he stressed. According to the American leader, moving on from that mindset and those kind of large-scale troop deployments wi