Bulgaria's Turks in the 1980s: a minority endangered1

In writing this article I was honoured to enlist the help of many people, to whom I owe enormous gratitude. Among them are Jenny Engström at the London School of Economics for numerous materials and conceptual guidance, Selçuk Colacoglu at Adnan Menderes University for linking me with migrants in Turkey who left Bulgaria in 1989, Chetin Kazak at the National Assembly of Republic of Bulgaria for providing me with the valuable documentary publication of surviving communist party archives, Tatiana Vaksberg for letting me see her “Technology of evil” within a very short notice, the people at the local Targovishte office of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms for their timely translation of several materials I received from Turkey and my interviewees whom I have been asked to keep anonymous. Last, but not least, I would like to thank my parents Malina and Dragomir, with whom I spent many hours discussing the article, for their revealing accounts of particular events in the 1980s. I attribute all the value of the article to these people.

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size

Notes

In writing this article I was honoured to enlist the help of many people, to whom I owe enormous gratitude. Among them are Jenny Engström at the London School of Economics for numerous materials and conceptual guidance, Selçuk Colacoglu at Adnan Menderes University for linking me with migrants in Turkey who left Bulgaria in 1989, Chetin Kazak at the National Assembly of Republic of Bulgaria for providing me with the valuable documentary publication of surviving communist party archives, Tatiana Vaksberg for letting me see her “Technology of evil” within a very short notice, the people at the local Targovishte office of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms for their timely translation of several materials I received from Turkey and my interviewees whom I have been asked to keep anonymous. Last, but not least, I would like to thank my parents Malina and Dragomir, with whom I spent many hours discussing the article, for their revealing accounts of particular events in the 1980s. I attribute all the value of the article to these people.

Bulgaria was on the losing side in the Second Balkan War of 1913, in the First World War and in the Second World War.

See Georgieva (1993) for a convincing anthropological account that the measures against the Bulgarian Turks adopted after 1985 were aimed at attacking their ethnicity and ethnic community. In their tradition the name, for example, is an inextricable component of someone's personality and has quasi‐magic power. It is kept secret before the baptism ceremony and the priest whispers it only in the child's ear. The sharp distinction between Turco‐Arabic and Bulgarian names was in part constructed by the process of nation and state building. Neither system represented a homogeneous nomenclature uninfluenced by the other (see Basgöz, 1983; Mizov, 1987).

Jenny Engström, presentation on the “Ethnic model of Bulgaria” within the Special Convention “Nationalism, Identity and Regional Cooperation: Compatibilities and Incompatibilities” organised by the Institute for Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe and the Association for the Study of Nationalities and held in Forlì, Italy in June 2002.

That Renaissance process in Bulgaria was directed against the Greek cultural and religious influence within the Empire's millet system as much and even more as it was directed against the Ottoman Empire itself (Poulton, 2000, pp 46–47).

Albania comes as an obvious exception to this group as the Muslim population remained a majority in the country after independence from the Ottoman Empire in the late nineteenth century.

Stola (1992, pp 324–325) defined forced migration as taking place when migrants are compelled to leave their home under threat or due to actual use of force, as well as due to well founded fear of being persecuted. In the case of forced migration in the strict sense such as expulsion or deportation the migrant is the subject of the action of a higher authority and has no choice. The degree and form of coercion vary. Some movements belong to the sphere in‐between, e.g. obligatory evacuation or induced exoduses. Between 1878 and 1990 Bulgaria exercised all variants of forced migration techniques towards its Muslim minorities.

The population inhabiting the strategic Rhodope mountains in the southwest. They confess Islam and speak Bulgarian. This population was the main target of forceful conversion to Islam by the Ottoman Empire (see Georgieva, 1998).

As a measure against circumcision parents with baby boys were asked to fill in declarations that they will not have their son circumcised because it is dangerous for his health and life. The following section of the declaration revealed the true reason for not having the boy circumcised—it is criminal offence punishable under Article 324.II and Article 20.III of the Penal Code in force at the time.

In October 1958 the Central Committee of BCP adopted the “Guidelines for Party Work among the Turkish Population,” which proved to be a radical shift in the definition of the nation (Ivanov, 1997, p 56).

“A nation is a historically constituted, stable community of people, formed on the basis of common language, territory, economic life, and psychological make‐up manifested in a common culture” (Stalin, 1973, p 59).

“All possible opportunities have been created for the Turkish population to develop their culture and language freely … The children of Turkish population must learn their mother tongue and perfect it. To this end it is necessary that the teaching of the Turkish language be improved in schools”—Zhivkov's speech in 1964 at the 10th anniversary of a publication by the Turkish Language Department of Sofia University (Amnesty International, 1986).

For a useful discussion of the development of Turkish‐language education in Bulgaria see Gökdağ (2003, pp 296–301). Gökdağ provides as well an interesting comparative analysis including other countries and territories on the Balkans.

Meting of the Politbureau of the Central Committee of BCP, June 6, 199 (see Levy, 2003, p 59).

“They [the Bulgarian Turks] have taken the main approaches to the border. Take for example Kardjali and other places—they have occupied them. Together with the main approaches to the Rhodope mountains. As we observed, they hold many strategic positions in the event of a future war … whole Turkish villages from inside the country where they enjoy good life wanted to move to the border. They are interested in the border” (Zhivkov, 1985b, pp 23, 25, emphasis added).

This is an enabling factor, not a reason for the renaming campaign. Another factor which, combined with the repressive potential of the regime, determined the intensity of the campaign was the end of the five‐year period for replacing all identity cards in December 1985. It was planned to end with a national census.

Georgi Markov was a prominent Bulgarian journalist who managed to escape communist Bulgaria and settle in London. For years he prepared the series “In absentia, reports about Bulgaria” for the BBC and worked as well for radio Free Europe and Deutsche Welle uncovering hideous details of the communist rule. He was assassinated in September 1978 after a skilful operation by the Bulgarian secret services. The real cause of his death, a poison called ricin, was determined in 1979 and it was only several years later, when two KGB officers Oleg Kalugin and Oleg Gordievsky spoke out, that the link to the secret services in Sofia and Moscow was established.

“There are 9–10 million Kurds there, there are Arabs, but they [the Turkish government] do not recognise them” (Zhivkov, 1985b, p 24).

See “24 Hours” newspaper (archives)—“Zhivkov to Gorbachov: we will force out 500,000 Turks” (February 19, 2003, p 17).

Stanko Todorov, then member of the Central Committee of BCP and Chairman of the National Assembly, held that “the workers considered their past and recognised their roots and Bulgarian national belonging” (Helsinki Watch, 1986).

“Officials say there are no Turks in Bulgaria,” RFE Bulgarian Situation Report, 1985, pp 4–7.

Success being measured in the long run by the shift in the self‐perception of people regarding their ethnic origins and sense of group belonging.

The word is borrowed from Tatiana Vaksberg's documentary “Technology of evil”.

By far the most preferred female names were Ana and Nina because of their semantic and audial proximity to Turco‐Arabic names.

This is the name of a prominent Bulgarian revolutionary who was very active in organising the resistance of Bulgarians within the Ottoman Empire. The Bulgarian Turks used a different name for that village.

It has to be noted that very often the death certificates of those killed during the renaming campaign were falsified to indicate another reason for the death, e.g. a disease or suicide (Levy, 2003, p 190).

The quoted sources provide ample documentary evidence, which was impossible to incorporate in this article due to space restrictions.

Only in the fall of 1986 a total of 1,300 new school teachers were settled to work in the district of Kardjali with a very good pay and a policy of not allowing them to find work elsewhere for a period of at least five years. “Territorial feudalism attacked,” RFE Bulgarian Situation Report, 1987, pp 9–14; Vaksberg's “Technology of evil”.

In those days it was not uncommon to hear a neighbour criticising parents or friends for calling someone by their original Turco‐Arabic, and not by their new Bulgarian, name.

Between 1949 and 1950 Bulgaria made use of the emigration agreement signed with Turkey to force out of the country between 150,000 and 200,000 Bulgarian Turks. In this period minority rights were constitutionally guaranteed and protected. A follow‐up agreement was signed in 1968, which allowed the close relatives of those who left earlier to join them. Another 40,000 people left Bulgaria for Turkey (see Amnesty International, 1986; Marrus, 1985, p 353).

“We are not announcing it and we must not announce it, but we have to drive out of the country at least 200,000 people”—Todor Zhivkov at the Meeting of the Politbureau of the Central Committee of BCP, June 6, 1989, griffed confidential (see Levy, 2003, p 59); “Somewhere some people talk about forced emigration. There is no forced emigration! We cancel once and for all the emigration question. Neither in the country, nor at international fora, nor with Turkey do we have to negotiate any forced emigration. We are interested in a wide exodus from the country based on the law”—Todor Zhikvov at the Meeting of Politbureau of the Central Committee of BCP with the first secretaries of the regional party committees, June 7, 1989 (see Levy, 2003, p 87).

Indeed, more than 40% of those who left returned within several months (see Table 2).

Within his televised address on May 29, 1989 Zhivkov skilfully mobilised the ethnic self‐consciousness among the population. In June he assessed that “it was correct to take this position … it created within the country a patriotic, Bulgarian, national boost that we have not had in years”—Todor Zhivkov at the Meeting of the Politbureau of the Central Committee of BCP, June 6, 1989, griffed confidential (see Levy, 2003, p 59).

“The second position is that we now cancel our strategic goal to convince these people [the Bulgarian Turks] that they are Bulgarian, that they are not Turks. [In my televised address] there is no mention that they are Bulgarian. This is not accidental”—Todor Zhikvov at the Meeting of Politbureau of the Central Committee of BCP with the first secretaries of the regional party committees, June 7, 1989 (see Levy, 2003, p 87).

“The country has an interest to let out some blood. What is unclean must flow out, because it turned out many of the organisers [of the protests] have been in camps and prisons. They are fanaticised to the extreme and for them there is no return … When all of them leave, things will slowly settle down”—Georgi Jordanov (then Minister of culture and education) at the Meeting of the Politbureau of the Central Committee of BCP, June 6, 1989, griffed confidential (see Levy, 2003, p 71).

After ousting Zhivkov from power in November 1989, the Central Committee of BCP held a plenary meeting on December 29 where the assimilation campaign was discussed. They agreed on a resolution, which stated that: “the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party rejects the campaign seeking the forced creation of an “ethnically monolithic Bulgarian nation” pursued by Todor Zhivkov's authoritarian regime and the related abuses of Bulgarian citizens” constitutional rights as fundamentally wrong and condemns it as grave political error” (Stamatov, 1999, p 10).

“There must be no speculation with the houses. We must take them without payment, so to say. They cannot be rented”—Todor Zhivkov; “They [the houses] must be bought out by public organisations, brigades, fatories, the state and then we could give them to volunteers who move into the area to work. Otherwise there is a danger that speculants will rush to buy them”—Vassil Tzanov (then member of the party's Central Committee) in Levy (2003, pp 68, 73).

One ethnic group monopolises the power of the state and uses it to dominate other groups. The hegemonic model is aimed at suppressing ethnic challenges to the government of the state or to the state itself (see Lemarchand, 1995; Lustick, 1997). In Bulgaria this model was characteristic of the years after the Liberation from the Ottoman Empire.

Hislope (1998) saw the “moments of generosity” as an indispensable factor for peaceful and unifying transition in multiethnic societies. They referred to the points of adoption and application of inclusive, liberal policies towards ethnic and religious minorities within the country, at which stage the chances are higher that they would fell the same level of political ownership as the majority. In Bulgaria this moment was applied in the first years of communism as well as after its departure.

Assimilation is usually attempted for minority groups that have not yet achieved a literary consciousness or political organisation beyond the kinship level (Snyder, 2000, pp 274–275).