Bulgaria

Bulgaria is situated in the Balkan Peninsula in southeastern Europe with an area of 42,823 square miles (110,912 square kilometers), bordered on the east with the Black Sea, Romania to the north, Macedonia and Serbia to the west, Turkey to the southeast, and Greece to the south. The official language is Bulgarian. The World Bank estimates the population at 7,364,570. Sofia, the capital city, has a population of 1.27 million and is the 12th-largest city in the European Union (EU). Its economy depends on brown coal (lignite), iron ore, oil, and natural gas. Bulgaria [Page 88]experienced a slight downturn, but has weathered the global economic crisis well. It has a gross domestic product (GDP) of $96.8 billion, with 12.8 percent of the population living below ...