A growing number of motor vehicle thefts has been registered over the first seven months of 2015, Bulgarian Interior Minister Rumyana Bachvarova has said.

Since January, there have been 2696 cases of cars being stolen - or roughly 385 per month, BGNES wire service quotes her as saying.

Half of these took place in the capital Sofia, which is also the most populous city of the country. Second in this "ranking" is the Black Sea city of Varna.

This is likely to result in an increase in yearly numbers compared to 2014, when 3198 such incidents were registered, and to 2013 (3170).

Bachvarova pointed out that in 2015 interest of "foreign and Bulgarian criminal structures in illegal motor vehicle smuggling remained steady, mostly due to the favorable geography, the presence of transport corridors and ports."

This suggests a number of cars stolen in Western Europe are either sold here or just transited via Bulgaria en route to Turkey, Greece, Ukraine, Russia, Georgia and the Middle East, in the Minister's words.