Petar Kostadinov
As of September 1 2008 all Bulgarian trucks have to pay a transit fee of 83 euro when entering Turkey. The fee was imposed by Turkish authorities in response to Bulgaria’s decision to introduce a similar measure against Turkish cargo companies.As of July 1 2008 Bulgaria started charging Turkish trucks with an 83 euro transit fee. According to the Turkish side, Bulgaria’s move was a breach of a 1979 Bulgarian-Turkish bilateral agreement on road transit that would allow both sides to transport goods without paying any additional fees.
Until July 1 2008, this meant that Turkish cargo trucks were paying only for the obligatory vignette sticker when going trough Bulgaria.
When Bulgaria decided to introduce the 83 euro fee the explanation authorities used was the fact that Bulgaria has become a European Union member state and the cargo traffic between the two countries needed to be discussed again. From its side Turkey did not accept this reasoning and called the fee a breach of the agreement and threatened to introduce a fee for Bulgarian cargo.
As a result Bulgaria’s Transport Ministry has proposed to the Turkish side to discuss the introduction of a regulatory framework that will apply for both Bulgarian and Turkish trucks vice versa. Such a framework currently exists for Serbian, Macedonian and Croatian trucks on transit via Bulgaria.
The issue with Turkish trucks transporting cargo via Bulgaria was first raised in February 2007 when Bulgarian cargo companies asked for restrictive measure against Turkish trucks. The companies said that since Bulgarian trucks were asked to pay transit fee from EU countries in the days when Bulgaria was not a member states there was no reason why Turkish truck should not be asked to do the same when passing trough Bulgaria.
Source : Sofia Echo