After long days of queues of trucks backing up at Bulgaria's border checkpoints with Greece because of a Greek farmers' protest, media reports on January 28 said that February 4 could see dairy farmers from Romania, Macedonia and Bulgaria mounting a joint blockade that would shut down all of Bulgaria's land borders.

The dairy farmers were reported to be planning the protest against competition from cheap milk imports from European Union countries. The idea of holding the protest jointly was that doing so would force Brussels to sit up and take notice.

The Greek farmers' protests, that went into their seventh day on January 28, angered Bulgarian road transport operators who said that financial losses were running into huge amounts - estimated at 10 million euro and counting - as trucks waited at the border.

Through government and diplomatic channels, Bulgaria and Greece had several exchanges on the issue. Bulgaria said that Greece, by not acting to end the farmers' blockade, was breaking EU rules on the free movement of goods and persons. On January 23, Greece apologised to Bulgaria for the disruption, and daily issued assurances to Bulgaria that it was working to resolve the situation.

The Greek farmers started the protest in an attempt to force the government in Athens to open new negotiations on the government's planned 500 million euro in agricultural subsidies. Greek prime minister Costas Karamanlis refused to back down.

The situation got a new dimension on January 28 when a report in Greek daily Express said that even the proposed 500 million euro subsidy scheme could be of questionable legality under EU rules. The newspaper said that, against EU rules, the European Commission had not been consulted on the subsidies.

The same day, media reports said that there had been a "split" in the Greek farmers' protests, with the blockade at the Isthmus of Corinith having ended while the future of other blockades was unclear.

On January 27, Bulgaria sent a formal message to the EC asking that it compel Greece to provide access through border checkpoints and along transport corridors. Transport Minister Petar Moutafchiev said that Bulgaria did not oppose European citizens' right to protest, but such protests should not be held in a way that violated the rights and freedoms of other European citizens.

From the weekend of January 24 and 25 onwards, negotiations between the Bulgarian and Greek sides allowed the occasional opening of border checkpoints to allow some truck traffic through. However, Bulgarian journalists reporting from the border said that in the initial stages, the arrangements for these openings were erratic. On January 26, one such opening reduced the queue of trucks at the Koulata checkpoint from 10km to four km.

As the protest wore on, Bulgaria's road transport association sent truckers supplies of mineral water. The Bulgarian Red Cross provided tinned food, water, bread and other supplies to truck drivers. The Government sent an ambulance to be on standby to assist with medical emergencies, and by January 28 chemical toilets had been placed near the waiting trucks.