Bulgaria decided to abandon the Russian MiG-29 fighters.

Despite the fact that the Bulgarian Air Force continues to protect the borders of the country with Russian MiG-29 multifunctional fighters, the military command of this country decided not to use these fighters, replacing them with "... combat aircraft of a new type ...", produced, most likely, by countries belonging to the North Atlantic Alliance or the EU.

"As follows from the requirements approved by the Bulgarian authorities, fighters must be built and deployed in at least one of the countries that are members of the North Atlantic Alliance (NATO - Ed.) Or the EU, which is logical from the point of view of our partnership commitments ", the Bulgarian president said in a statement.

"The choice of Bulgaria is fundamental, it is obvious that without pressure from NATO and the EU there has not been. MiG-29 fighters are beautiful planes, and this is the reason for Bulgaria's commitment to them ", - said a specialist Avia.pro.

On the other hand, it remains unknown why in March this year Bulgaria signed an agreement with the Russian MiG corporation to repair MiG-29 fighters for a total of 40,5 million euros, which may still mean that these planes will continue to be in the arsenal of this country.

"Countries that exploited Soviet and Russian aircraft are well aware of their high efficiency, and even those of machines that are older than 30 years, can still be used to protect states from external threats. This applies not only to Bulgaria, but also to Croatia, Serbia and even Ukraine, which, it would seem, chose the principled position of renouncing Soviet and Russian weapons ", - the expert states.

To date, the armed forces of the Bulgarian Air Force has 15 fighters MiG-29 - 12 combat aircraft and 3 training vehicles.

* MiG-29 is a Soviet / Russian multi-role fighter of the fourth generation developed at the MiG OKB in 1982.