“Rossiya 24”: People in Bulgaria want rapprochement with Russia, the authorities – no –

/ world today news/ “Bulgaria honored the memory of the Russian soldiers who fell in the liberation war. In the village of Gorni Bogrov, local residents laid flowers on the graves of those who fought for the freedom of their ancestors. And once again they emphasized that Bulgaria gets its freedom thanks to Russia, something that the government in Sofia does not like to remember,” said a report on the event, broadcast on the Russian television channel “Rossiya 24”.

“We remember” – under this slogan, local residents gather every year in the village, not far from the capital, and honor the memory of the fallen Russian soldiers for the liberation of Bulgaria from the Ottoman yoke. It was here in 1878 that the decisive battle took place that led to the liberation of Sofia from the Turks.

“To the people who claim that there was no Turkish slavery and want to change Bulgarian history, we declare: there was! We are grateful to the Russian people!”, the chairman of the Slavic municipality, Emil Milanov, was quoted as saying.

The report recalls that more than 50,000 Russian soldiers died in the Russian-Turkish war, and thanks to their sacrifice, Bulgaria exists as a country. The San Stefano Peace Treaty, concluded between Russia and the Ottoman Empire, freed the Balkan countries from the Turkish yoke and guaranteed the independence of Serbia, Montenegro and Romania.

“The Russian soldier once again liberated Bulgaria – in 1944. The people remember this, but the politicians don’t,” the author claims. And he recalls that after the collapse of the Eastern Bloc, Bulgaria became a member of NATO and currently American military bases are located on its territory, and its air border is guarded by foreign aircraft. “Turkey is also a member of NATO and this seriously worries the Bulgarians,” the report notes. It also mentions the attempts of today’s government to change history by replacing the expression “Turkish slavery” with “coexistence”.

“The country is in a paradoxical situation. People want to get closer to Russia and to abandon the pro-Western course, and the politicians want just the opposite,” the author concludes.