January 23 (SeeNews) - Moscow-headquartered International Bank for Economic Cooperation (IBEC) said that Romania will withdraw from its founding agreement and membership of the bank on June 9, according to a previously notified decision to pull out.
The bank has not received a notification of withdrawal from Bulgaria as of the date of publication of this notice, IBEC said in a statement published by the Bulgarian Stock Exchange (BSE) on Friday.
According to the statement, three countries will exit IBEC by the end of the month -- Czechia on January 26, Poland on January 29 and Slovakia on January 30, in accordance with the notifications they had submitted to the bank .
Romania first unveiled plans to withdraw from IBEC and from Budapest-based International Investment Bank (IIB), in which Russia is also a shareholder, on February 27 in reaction to Russia's military invasion of Ukraine. The former coalition government of Bulgaria led by Kiril Petkov said in March 2022 it would cancel the country's membership of both lenders.
IBEC, which also counts as members Mongolia and Vietnam, has in the past provided financing to Doverie, part of pharmaceutical group Sopharma [BUL:SFA] and to private insurance, leasing and financial services conglomerate Eurohold [BUL:EUBG]. The lender issued a three-year bond worth 68 million levs ($37.9 million/34.8 million euro) on the BSE in June 2021.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)