UK retailer Marks & Spencer has announced it is pulling out of Bulgaria, Croatia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia.

M&S has 12 stores (employing 106 people) in these five Southeastern European countries, three of them in Bulgaria.

The goal is to "firmly focus" on "successful businesses in Romania, Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia and Hungary," British media outlets quote an M&S spokesperson as saying. New stores will be launched in the Czech Republic and Poland over the next two years.

The closure in the countries affected is set to begin in January.