Balkan Immigrants' Organization: Bulgaria "Won Our Heart" with Events It Organized for Centenary of Turkish Republic

A snapshot from the meeting "Culture and education - a bridge between Bulgaria and Turkiye", Ankara, November 7, 2023 (BTA Photo)

Ankara,

07.11.2023 19:37

(BTA)

Bulgaria won the heart of Turkiye with the events it organized on the occasion of the centenary of the founding of the Turkish Republic, including the staging of the opera Tosca by the Sofia Opera and Ballet in Ankara and Istanbul, said Yuksel Özkale, who chairs the BISAV organization of Balkan immigrants in Ankara. He was speaking during a meeting "Culture and education - a bridge between Bulgaria and Turkiye", which took place Tuesday at the BTA National Press Club in Ankara.

Özkale said that this year marks both the centenary of the founding of the Turkish Republic and the establishment of diplomatic relations between Bulgaria and Turkiye.

"For us, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk is a very important value," the BISAV chairman further stressed.

In his words, Bulgaria "has stolen the heart of Turkiye" with these important events that it has organized on the occasion of the centenary.

The Rector of the Thracian University in Stara Zagora Prof. Dr. Dobri Yarkov, said that his University will be "part of the bridge that is being created between Turkiye and Bulgaria in the field of education and science". He said: "We have dozens of students from Turkiye who are strongly motivated. They are doctors, veterinarians mainly, but I feel with my heart that a new stage in our cooperation with Turkiye opens after its centenary." He added that culture, education and science make the most solid bridges between people.

Bulgarian National Radio (BNR) Director General Milen Mitev said that culture is the most direct way for peoples to get to know each other. "If politics sometimes divides us, culture always has the power to unite us," he said.

He highlighted the contribution of BNR to strengthening the bond between the Bulgarian and Turkish people. "76 years separate us from the first Turkish-language broadcasts of the national radio. Over the years, BNR's Turkish service has faced various economic and political obstacles, but fortunately the desire of our colleagues to provide information in all mother tongues for the people of Bulgaria and our compatriots around the world eventually prevailed and today we continue to have both on-air broadcasts and internet news in Turkish," he said.

This year BNR revived another project: to record folklore pieces of the Turkish ethnic group in Bulgaria, in which young musicians and singers perform new arrangements of traditional songs that are part of the culture of the Turkish community in Bulgaria. "We are thinking of continuing this project with the release of this music, because we at BNR also believe in the power of culture to improve the ties between peoples," the BNR Director General said.

/NF/