The Bulgarians will buy the Panther helicopters well… without enthusiasm
(BRUSSELS2) The Bulgarian Ministry of Defense should finally confirm the purchase of 6 additional helicopters from Europcopter. A little reluctantly... He had signed a contract for 18 of which 12 Cougars have already been delivered to Bulgaria and 6 Panther Marine helicopters still remained to be delivered. Savings oblige, he wanted to give up the order of three of these six remaining helicopters. But Eurocopter used solid counter-arguments, in the form of the payment of a major penalty. The Minister of Defense, Aniou Anguélov, therefore sided with reason, explaining at the beginning of June, as reported by the national daily sega, « that it is important to finalize the negotiations relating to this contract, which are still ongoing ". Last point of the negotiation between the Bulgarians and the Franco-European manufacturer: the Bulgarian request to strengthen the protection of the Cougars, by installing an anti-ammunition protection system developed by the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.