Bulgarian National Television (BNT) is Bulgaria's public TV. It was founded in 1959. Its official launch was on December 26 of the same year. Presently BNT operates on the basis of the Law for Radio and Television from 1998. It is a national public broadcasting station. It has four regional centers situated in the cities of Blagoevgrad, Varna, Plovdiv and Russe. Since July 19, 2001 BNT has been a licensed nationwide communication operator and TV broadcaster with its Channel 1 as well as the regional stations’ programs – “Pirin”, “More”, “Plovdiv” and “Sever”. During the past several years BNT programs won prestigious awards at Prix Danube Festival (Slovakia), the Golden Vityaz (Russia), Prix Nike (Portugal), Prix Jeunesse (Germany), Prix CIRCOM, Golden Albena (Bulgaria), Bar (Montenegro), Golden Cairo Film Festival (Egypt), Golden Rose (Switzerland), etc. BNT also regularly participates with own programs in numerous international festivals such as Japan Prize, Monte Carlo International TV Festival, Thessaloniki International Festival for TV Documentaries, International TV Festival for short-feature films in Oberheim (Germany), the International Documentary TV Festival in Cracow (Poland), the FIAT International Festival for archive materials, The Golden Prague International Festival, PRIX Italia, etc. BNT is an active member of the European Broadcasting Union. It is also a member of the following international organizations: EGTA, IMZ, CIRCOM Regional, FIAT and BBLF.