(BTA) -The Bulgarian News Agency (BTA) signed a cooperation agreement with Greece' Athens - Macedonian News Agency (AMNA). The document was signed by BTA Director General Kiril Valchev and his Greek counterpart Emilios Perdikaris.

The agreement marks the beginning of systematic cooperation between the two agencies, which will exchange one news item per day on an important event for the respective country.

"We will mutually edit each other in choosing the most important of the many news items, we will publish this news and we hope that at the end of each year will accumulate at least 365 news sources from our agencies," said Kiril Valchev before the signing of the document.

In September, when the 30th General Assembly of the Association of the Balkan News Agencies - Southeast Europe (ABNA-SE) will be held in Bulgaria, BTA and AMNA will propose a joint project for a Balkan newsroom so that exchanges can take place between all agencies.

"This is the beginning of an even bigger project. We agreed to work together for a systematic exchange of photos between the Balkan agencies and now we will start experimentally exchanging photos with each other," Valchev said.

The contract also provides for the exchange of professional visits.

"This is the first contract between the two agencies in 25 years," Emilios Perdikaris said. He stressed that BTA and AMNA do not want the agreement to remain only on paper, but to be implemented in practice. Perdikaris noted that this is the first step in a wider co-operation between the two agencies. He stressed the fact that the information exchanged between the two agencies will be from a reliable source.

Perdikaris added that so far the two agencies have cooperated very well, but the agreement signed on Friday provides more opportunities for joint activities. BTA and AMNA had a contract in 1996, which expired a year later, which was not renewed and the two national agencies did not have a formal relationship until now. ZH/DT/DT/