Bulgaria's gas monopoly Bulgargaz will maintain limited deliveries to all its clients in the municipality of Shoumen, northeastern Bulgaria, amid fears that the region would be left out in the cold.

The local heat utility company has accumulated a debt of more than 15 million leva to Bulgargaz, and there were fears that the gas provider would shut supply and leave local residents to fend for themselves.

However, Bulgarian Prime Minister Boiko Borissov has stepped in and held an emergency meeting with the municipal director of Shoumen, Dimitar Alexandrov, and GERB head of Shoumen municipal advisers, Dobrin Dobrev, regarding the worsening crisis.

Borissov stressed during the meeting that it was unfair that Shoumen's children, students and residents should suffer because of the problem, the report said.

As a consequence, a decision was made for Bulgargaz to continue supplying the local heat utility company, albeit with restricted capacity, the Bulgarian news agency reported on January 4 2010.

Earlier, Bulgargaz executive head Dimitar Gogov said that he had ordered the suspension of gas deliveries to Toplofikatsia Shoumen from December 28.

But Shoumen mayor Krassimir Kostov issued an instruction prohibiting Bulgartransgaz employees to be allowed to turn off the gas supply.

A day earlier, local representatives of the ruling GERB party said that they wanted Kostov to resign because of the problems with the heating utility.

Toplofikatsia Shoumen, which owes 15.5 million leva to Bulgargaz, had pledged to repay 2.3 million leva of its arrears by December 2010, but failed to fulfill its commitments.