IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING JUST WHY IT IS THE BULGARIANS DON'T RULE THE WORLD

Some fifteen Bulgarian soldiers have filed requests to quit Bulgaria's infantry unit in Karbala after a week of fighting with radical Shiites.

Amid mounting public pressure for Iraq pullout Defence Minister Nikolay Svinarov announced that the Bulgarian camp can be relocated some fifteen kilometers away from Karbala center.

No definitive decision on the issue has been taken yet, he added.

The minister is expected to make a report on the situation in Karbala to the parliamentary foreign policy, defence and security commission on April 22.

There are several requests from Bulgarian soldiers to return home. This comes as no surprise and may happen everywhere in the world where international missions are deployed, Foreign Minister Solomon Passy told private bTV channel earlier in the day.

He said that anybody who wants to return from Karbala is free to do so as the mission has been recruited on a voluntary basis.