site.btaPresident Radev Raises to Turkish Counterpart Question of Compensation for Eastern Thrace Refugees' Properties

ESD 16:22:01 19-08-2018
DS1619ES.102
102 POLITICS - PRESIDENT - UPRISING - ANNIVERSARY

President Radev Raises to
Turkish Counterpart Question of
Compensation for Eastern Thrace Refugees' Properties


Petrova Niva, Southeastern Bulgaria, August 19 (BTA) - President Rumen Radev has directly raised the question of compensation for the land properties of Eastern Thrace refugees to his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Radev said here on Saturday night. He was in the Petrova Niva historic area to participate in a national commemorative gathering for the 115th anniversary of the Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising.

The matter concerns 52,000 ethnic Bulgarians who were forced to resettle to Bulgaria from Eastern Thrace in Turkey after the 1913 Second Balkan War, leaving behind land properties which, according to an official document prepared by the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry in 1983, were worth over 10,000 million US dollars at that time.

President Radev persistently raises the issue and says that Bulgarian officials should take every opportunity to do so.

On Saturday, Radev said he will continue to demand clear answers when historical facts get disregarded and questioned.

The event in the Petrova Niva area took place under the auspices of the head of State. Attending were Deputy Prime Minister Valeri Simeonov, Union of Thracian Associations head Krassimir Premyanov, MPs, public figures, mayors from the region, and hundreds of citizens.

Bulgarian Socialist Party leader Kornelia Ninova also took part in the gathering. In her speech she said that for 115 years history has kept the legacy of the brave participants in the Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising that people should not put up with any tyranny. "Today we are obliged to respect our history and not allow it to be distorted and appropriated. Our heroes fell for freedom and for Bulgaria. Now it is our turn to protect them," Ninova said.

On July 29, 1903, in the Petrova Niva area 300 delegates, voivodes and rebels decided to proclaim an Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising, which broke out on August 6. In 1958, a monument to the fallen heroes was placed on the site of the gathering.

LN/DS