Timeline Bulgaria

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The Thracians lived in what is now Bulgaria and parts of modern Greece, Romania, Macedonia, and Turkey between 4,000 B.C. and the 8th century A.D., when they were assimilated by the invading Slavs.
    (AP, 7/16/07)
Bulgaria Chronology 1989-1999: http://www.projects.v2.nl/~arns/Texts/Chrono/BG.html
History: http://www.digsys.bg/books/history/index.html
5000BC    The Thracian village of Nebet Tepe, later Plovdid, Bulgaria, dated to about this time. It was redeveloped by the Macedonians, Romans, Byzantines, Bulgars and Turks.
    (SSFC, 7/16/06, p.G4)

4000BC    Skilled goldsmiths [proto-Thracians] lived in the area of Varna on the Black Sea.
    (SFEC, 2/1/98, p.T3)(SFEC, 8/2/98, DB p.22)

2100BC-2000BC    Some 15,000 tiny Golden rings, estimated at 4,100 to 4,200 years old, were found in 2005 near Dabene, Bulgaria. They were attributed to proto-Thracians, ancestors of the Thracians, who lived in the area until they were assimilated by invading Slavs in the 8th century.
    (SFC, 8/17/05, p.A2)
 
c585BC    Greeks settled in the Area of Varna on the Black Sea about this time and were followed by the Romans, Byzantines and Turks.
    (SFEC, 2/1/98, p.T3)

400BC        In 2007 a 2,400-year-old golden mask that once belonged to a Thracian king was unearthed in a timber-lined tomb in southeastern Bulgaria.
    (AP, 7/17/07)

359BC-336BC        Philip II ruled the Greek kingdom of Macedonia. During this period he founded Plovdiv, Bulgaria.
    (WUD, 1994, p.1081)(SFC, 7/18/96, p.E1)

100-200    Serdica was home to a Roman amphitheater. It stood on the trade road between the Danube and Constantinople. Known to the Romans as Serdica, it later became known as Sophia, the capital of Bulgaria.
    (AM, 7/04, p.14)

117        The Trimontium amphitheater was built in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. The area was later sacked by Attila the Hun and the site was covered in dirt until a landslide exposed it in 1972.
    (SSFC, 7/16/06, p.G4)

650         The Khazars’ aggressive territorial expansion drove some Bulgars westward. These Bulgars soon founded a kingdom in the southeastern Balkans that became known as Bulgaria.
    (TJOK, 1999, p.16)

681        Bulgaria’s 1st kingdom was established.
    (WPR, 3/04, p.28)

700-800    Invading Slavs assimilated the Thracians in the area of modern Bulgaria and parts of Greece, Romania, Macedonia and Turkey.
    (SFC, 8/17/05, p.A2)
700-800    The Madara Horseman in Kaspichan was carved into a sandstone cliff.
    (SFEC, 8/28/98, p.T4)

811        Jul 26, Nicephorus I, Byzantine Emperor (802-11), died in the Battle at Pliska. The Bulgarian under monarch Krum beat the Byzantines.
    (MC, 7/26/02)

917        Aug 20, A Byzantine counter-offensive was routed by Syeon at Anchialus, Bulgaria.
    (HN, 8/20/98)

927        May 27, Symeon, czar of Bulgaria, died.
    (MC, 5/27/02)

927        Ivan Rilski (later St. John of Rila), an Orthodox Bulgarian, chose a hermit’s life in a cave in the mountains above Sofia, Bulgaria. His students built a complex nearby that grew to become the Rila Monastery.
    (SSFC, 7/16/06, p.G4)

1014        Oct 6, The Byzantine Emperor Basil II (958-1025) earned the title "Slayer of Bulgars" after he ordered the blinding of 15,000 Bulgarian troops. Basil II was godfather to Russia’s Prince Vladimir.
    (HN, 10/6/98)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basil_II)(Econ, 2/16/08, p.60)

1018        By this year Basil II had annexed Bulgaria.
    (WSJ, 1/11/99, p.R6)

1850        Jun 27, Ivan Vazov, poet, novelist, playwright (Under the Yoke), was born in Bulgaria.
    (SC, 6/27/02)

1861        Feb 26, Ferdinand I, 1st tsar of modern Bulgaria (1908-18), was born in Vienna.
    (SC, 2/26/02)

1867        Khristo Botev completed his education in Russia and returned to Bulgaria only to flee to Romania. There he joined his friend Stephan Stambulov in promoting a Bulgarian liberation movement through literature, journalism and simply organizing dissidents. He was a hero of the Bulgarian nationalist movement against Turkish rule in the 19th century—and also a poet.
    (HNQ, 9/7/00)

1868        Bulgaria’s Buzludzha peak area was the place of the final battle between rebels led by Hadji Dimitar and Stefan Karadzha and the Ottoman Empire.
    (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buzludzha)

1876        May, During an uprising in central Bulgaria (part of the overall “Eastern Crisis‘ in the Balkans from 1875-78), Khristo Botev, nationalist hero and poet, re-entered Bulgaria with a small band of rebels. He was killed near Mt. Veslez a few days after his return.
    (HNQ, 9/7/00)

1876        Russia under Alexander II invaded Ottoman-controlled Bulgaria with a mixture of humanitarian and imperialistic motives following reports that Turks were massacring Bulgarians.
    (SFC, 9/7/08, Books p.5)

1878        Mar 3, Russia and the Ottomans signed the Treaty of San Stefano, granting independence to Serbia. With the Treaty of San Stefano (and subsequent negotiations in Berlin) in the wake of the last Russo-Turkish War, the Ottoman Empire lost its possession of numerous territories including Bulgaria, Montenegro, Romania, and Serbia. The Russo-Turkish wars dated to the 17th century, the Russians generally gaining territory and influence over the declining Ottoman Empire. In the last war, Russia and Serbia supported rebellions in the Balkans. In concluding the Treaty of San Stefano, the Ottomans released control of Montenegro, Romania and Serbia, granted autonomy to Bosnia and Herzegovina, and allowed an autonomous state of Bulgaria to be placed under Russian control.
    (HN, 3/3/99)(HNQ, 2/23/01)
1878         Mar 3, The Treaty of San Stefano was signed after Russo-Turkish War. It assigned Albanian-populated lands to Bulgaria, Montenegro and Serbia; but Austria-Hungary and Britain blocked the treaty's implementation. Albanian leaders meet in Prizren, Kosova, to form the League of Prizren. The League initially advocated autonomy for Albania. At the Congress of Berlin, the Great Powers overturned the Treaty of San Stefano and divided Albanian lands among several states. The League of Prizren began to organize resistance to the Treaty of Berlin's provisions that affected Albanians.
    (www, Albania, 1998)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_San_Stefano)

1878        At this time Bulgaria had no army. By 1913, it had one of the most formidable land forces in Europe.
    (HN, 6/24/98)

1885        Sep 18, A coup d’etat in Eastern Rumelia led directly to a war between Serbia and Bulgaria. The Balkan peace settlement established by the 1878 Treaty of Berlin was undone when a coup d’etat in the disputed province of Eastern Rumelia resulted in Eastern Rumelia (separated from Bulgaria in 1878) announcing its re-unification with Bulgaria. Serbian prince Milan responded by demanding Bulgaria cede some of its territory to Serbia. An international conference convened and became deadlocked in November and Serbia declared war.
    (HNQ, 4/2/99)

1885        Nov 17, The Serbian Army, with Russian support, invaded Bulgaria.
    (HN, 11/17/98)

1885        Nov 19, Bulgarians, led by Stefan Stambolov, repulsed a larger Serbian invasion force at Slivinitza.
    (HN, 11/19/98)

1885        Nov 26, Bulgaria moved into Serbia.
    (HNQ, 4/2/99)

1886        Mar 3, The Treaty of Bucharest concluded the Serb-Bulgarian war, reestablishing prewar Serbo-Bulgarian borders but leaving Eastern Rumelia and Bulgaria united.
    (HNQ, 4/2/99)

1886        The Cathedral of the Assumption was built in Varna, Bulgaria.
    (SFEC, 2/1/98, p.T3)

1891        Bulgarian socialists led by Dimitar Blagoev assembled secretly in the Buzludzha peak area to form an organized socialist movement.
    (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buzludzha)

1894        Jan 30, Boris III  (d.1943), czar of Bulgaria (1918-43), was born.
    (SFC, 9/6/00, p.A10)(MC, 1/30/02)

1895        Jul 15, Stephen Stambulov, ex-prime minister of Bulgaria was murdered by Macedonian rebels.
    (HN, 7/15/98)

1901        Sep 3, Miss Ellen Stone, a Protestant missionary from Haverhill, Mass., was kidnapped in Bulgaria by a Macedonian revolutionary gang, who demanded $110,000 in gold. Katerina Tsilka, her pregnant Bulgarian companion, was also kidnapped and gave birth during her captivity to a baby girl. In 2003 Teresa Carpenter authored "The Miss Stone Affair: America's First Modern Hostage Crisis."
    (SSFC, 6/22/03, p.M4)

1903        Jan 3, The Bulgarian government renounced the treaty of commerce tying it to Austro-Hungarian empire.
    (HN, 1/3/99)

1903        Sep 8, Between 30,000 and 50,000 Bulgarian men, women and children were massacred in Monastir by Turkish troops seeking to check a threatened Macedonian uprising.
    (HN, 9/8/98)

1903        Sep 17, Turks destroyed the town of Kastoria in Bulgaria, killing 10,000 civilians.
    (HN, 9/17/98)

1905        Jul 25, Elias Canetti, Bulgarian-British novelist, essayist (Nobel 1981), was born.
    (SC, 7/25/02)

1908        Sep 22, Bulgaria declared independence from Ottoman Empire (Turkey).
    (MC, 9/22/01)

1912        Oct 17, Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia declared war on Turkey. [see Oct 18]
    (MC, 10/17/01)

1912        Oct 18, The First Balkan War broke out between the members of the Balkan League-- Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece and Montenegro--and the Ottoman Empire. A small Balkan War broke out and was quelled by the major powers. Albanian nationalism spurred repeated revolts against Turkish dominion and resulted in the First Balkan War in which the Turks were driven out of much of the Balkan Peninsula. Austria-Hungary’s 1908 annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina spurred Serbian efforts to form the Balkan alliance with its neighbors.  As a result of the war on Turkey, Serbia doubled its territory with the award of Northern Macedonia. Albanian leaders affirmed Albania as an independent state. [see Oct 8]
    (V.D.-H.K.p.290)(CO, Grolier’s/ Albania)(HN, 10/18/98)(HNQ, 3/27/99)(www, Albania, 1998)

1912        Nov 5, Bulgarian troops in Constantinople blockaded drinking water.
    (MC, 11/5/01)

1912        Dec 3, Turkey, Serbia, Montenegro, Greece and Bulgaria signed a weapons pact.
    (MC, 12/3/01)

1912        Dec 4, An armistice was signed to end the First Balkan War. Following several victories over the Ottoman army, coalition forces occupied Macedonia and forced the Ottoman Empire to seek an armistice.
    (www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov61.html)

1913        Feb 7, Turks lost 5,000 men in a battle with the Bulgarian army in Gallipoli.
    (HN, 2/7/99)

1913        Mar 26, The Balkan allies took Adrianople. Bulgaria captured Adrianople, ending the 1st Balkan War.
    (HN, 3/25/98)(SS, 3/26/02)

1913        Jun 1, Serbia and Greece concluded a secret treaty for joint action against Bulgaria; joined by Romania. Dissatisfied with their share of the spoils, Serbia, denied its proposed outlet to the Adriatic Sea, sought compensation in Macedonia along the Vardar River which the Bulgarians rejected while Greece asked for control of Thessaloniki and "a certain part" of the eastern Macedonian territories, which Bulgaria rejected as well.
    (www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov61.html)

1913        Jun 24, Greece and Serbia annulled their alliance with Bulgaria following border disputes over Macedonia and Thrace.
    (HN, 6/24/98)

1913        Jun 29, Anticipating assistance from Austro-Hungary the Bulgarian army attacked its former allies. This Second Balkan War was at first waged entirely on Macedonian soil. Bulgaria defeated Greek and Serbian troops.
    (www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov61.html)

1913        Jul 1, Serbia and Greece declared war on Bulgaria.
    (MC, 7/1/02)

1913        Jul 10, Rumania entered the Second Balkan War and four days later the Ottoman Empire joined the general assault on Bulgaria. Faced with four fronts, Bulgarian armies were defeated piecemeal and the government at Sofia was forced to seek peace. Atrocities were widespread. For example, in pursuing the Bulgarian army Greek forces systematically burnt to the ground all Macedonian villages they encountered, mass-murdering their entire populations. Likewise, when the Greek army entered Kukush (Kilkis) and occupied surrounding villages, about 400 old people and children were imprisoned and killed. Nor did the Serbian "liberators" lag behind in destruction and wanton slaughter throughout Macedonia. In Bitola, Skopje, Shtip and Gevgelija, the Serbian army, police and chetniks (guerrillas) committed their own atrocities.
    (www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov61.html)

1913        Jul 31, Bulgaria signed an armistice concluding the 2nd Balkan War. [see Aug 10]
    (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balkan_Wars)

1913        Aug 10, The Treaty of Bucharest ended the Second Balkan War. It was concluded by the delegates of Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro, and Greece. The entire "disputed zone" was taken by Serbia, Greece secured its position in Thessaloniki and southeastern Macedonia, the Ottomans regained all the territories lost in the First Balkan War to Bulgaria with the exception of eastern (Pirin) Macedonia, and the Romanians seized Southern Dobruja. 
    (www.maknews.com/html/articles/stefov/stefov61.html)

1913        Sep 29, The Treaty of Constantinople was signed. Turkey obtained not only Adrianople, but also Kirk Kilissé and Demotica. The Bulgarians were not even left masters of the one railway leading to Dedeagatch, their sole port on the Aegean Sea.
    (www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/boshtml/bos151.htm)

1914        Nov 20, Bulgaria proclaimed its neutrality in the First World War.
    (HN, 11/20/98)

1915        Sep 24, Bulgaria mobilized troops on the Serbian border.
    (HN, 9/24/98)

1915        Oct 11, A Bulgarian anti Serbian offensive began.
    (MC, 10/11/01)

1915        Oct 16, Great Britain declared war on Bulgaria.
    (MC, 10/16/01)

1915        Oct 19, Russia and Italy declared war on Bulgaria.
    (MC, 10/19/01)

1916        Sep 1, Bulgaria declared war on Rumania as the First World War expanded.
    (HN, 9/1/99)

1916        Sep 27, Constance of Greece declared war on Bulgaria.
    (HN, 9/27/98)

1917        Jan 5, Bulgarian and German troops occupied the Port of Braila in East Romania.
    (HN, 1/5/99)(WUD, 1994, p.178)

1918          Mar 3, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, the Ottoman Empire and Russia signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, which ended Russian participation in World War I. Germany and Austria forced Soviet Russia to sign the Peace of Brest, which called for the establishment of 5 independent countries: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, which ended Russian participation in World War I, was annulled by the November 1918 armistice. The treaty deprived the Soviets of White Russia.
    (HN, 3/3/99)(LHC, 3/1/03)(AP, 3/3/08)

1918        Sep 30, Bulgaria pulled out of World War I.
    (HN, 9/30/98)

1919        Nov 27, Bulgaria signed peace treaty with Allies at Neuilly, France, fixing war reparations and recognizing Yugoslavian independence.
    (HN, 11/27/98)

1923        Jun 9, Bulgaria’s government was overthrown by the military.
    (HN 6/9/98)

1930        Oct 4, King Boris Cobourgh-Gotha III married Giovanna of Savoy, the daughter of Vittorio Emanuele, the former king. Queen Ioanna died in 2000 at age 92.
    (SFC, 2/29/00, p.A19)

1933        Feb 27, Germany's parliament building, the Reichstag, caught fire. The Nazis blamed the Communists and used the fire as a pretext for suspending civil liberties and increasing their power. Georgi Dimitrov, a Bulgarian Communist, was one of the accused plotters, but was acquitted. After WW II Dimitrov became the 1st premier of communist Bulgaria. In 2003 Ivo Banac edited "The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov."
    (AP, 2/27/98)(HN, 2/27/99)(WSJ, 6/6/03, p.W9)

1935        Apr 21, King Boris of Bulgaria forbade all political parties.
    (MC, 4/21/02)

1935-1943    Georgi Dimitrov, a Bulgarian communist selected by Stalin, led the Comintern.
    (WSJ, 6/6/03, p.W9)

1939-1945    No Bulgarian Jew was killed during the Holocaust.
    (SFC, 9/6/00, p.A10)

1940        Jul 2, Georgi Ivan Ivanov, 1st Bulgarian space traveler (Soyuz 33), was born.
    (SC, 7/2/02)

1941         Mar 1, Bulgaria joined the Axis as the Nazis occupy Sofia.
    (WUD, 1944, p.1683)(HN, 3/1/98)

1941        Mar 3, Moscow denounced the Axis rule in Bulgaria.
    (HN, 3/3/99)

1941        Mar 5, Britain severed all relation with Bulgaria and prepared for an air attack on Bulgaria.
    (HN, 3/5/98)

1943        Aug 16, Bulgarian czar Boris III visited Adolf Hitler.
    (MC, 8/16/02)

1943        Dec 10, Allied forces bombed Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria.
    (HN, 12/10/98)

1943        Dec 11, U.S. Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, demanded that Hungary, Rumania, and Bulgaria withdraw from the war.
    (HN, 12/11/98)

1943        Bulgarian King Boris Cobourgh-Gotha III died shortly after he yielded to pressure from Adolph Hitler to ally with Nazi Germany. Prince Simeon (6) acceded to the thrown and reigned under regencies until 1946 when the monarchy was abolished.
    (SFC, 2/29/00, p.A19)
1943        Bulgarians occupying Macedonia rounded up and deported 7,148 Macedonian Jews to the death camp at Treblinka. Of a pre-war population of some 8,000 Jews, only 350 remained after the war.
    (Econ, 7/16/11, p.88)

1944        Aug 26, Bulgaria announced that it had withdrawn from the war (World War II) and that German troops in the country were to be disarmed.
    (RTH, 8/26/99)

1944-1947    King Simeon II reigned over Bulgaria when he was 6 to 9 years old. The Communists sent him packing.
    (SFC, 6/27/97, p.A16)

1946        Sep 8, Bulgaria ended its monarchy. The monarchy was abolished in a referendum called by communists installed by the Soviet Army. Georgi Dimitrov became the 1st premier of communist Bulgaria. In 2003 Ivo Banac edited "The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov."
    (SFC, 2/29/00, p.A19)(MC, 9/8/01)(WSJ, 6/6/03, p.W9)

1947        Sep 23, Nikola Petkov, leader of Bulgaria  party, was hanged.
    (MC, 9/23/01)

1949        Jan 1, Bulgaria inaugurated a 5-year plan.
    (EWH, 1968, p.1193)

1949        Jun 25, Communist Deputy Premier Traicho Kostov was arrested and charged with ideological deviation and treason. He and ten associates were found guilty and executed on Dec 16.
    (EWH, 1968, p.1194)

1949        Jul 2, Premier Georgi Dimitrov (b.1882), the founding leader of Bulgarian communism, died in Moscow while undergoing medical treatment. His remains were placed in a marble mausoleum in Sophia. He was succeeded by Vassil Kolarov. Dimitrov’s remains were buried in 1990. In 2003 Ivo Banac edited "The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov."
    (EWH, 1968, p.1194)(SFC, 9/10/99, p.A12)(WSJ, 6/6/03, p.W9)(SFC, 9/10/08, p.A5)

1949        Dec 14, Bulgarian ex-Premier Traicho Kostov was sentenced to die for treason in Sofia.
    (HN, 12/14/98)

1950        Feb 21, The United States formally broke relations with Bulgaria.
    (HN, 2/21/98)

1952        Vincentius Bossilkov, the Bishop of Nikopolis, was convicted at a Stalinist-era show trial for refusing to accept a law aimed at removing the local Catholic Church from Vatican jurisdiction. He was tried, tortured, shot and buried in a common grave. He was beatified in 1998.
    (SFC, 3/16/98, p.A9)

1954        Mar 4, In Bulgaria Communist ruler Todor Zhivkov began a 35-year dictatorship.  During his rule he authorized a forced assimilation drive against the 1 million ethnic Turks. Over 100 were killed and some 310,000 forcibly expelled.
    (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Todor_Zhivkov)(SFC, 8/7/98, p.D3)

1954        A new bridge across the Danube linked the cities of Ruse, Bulgaria, and Giurgiu, Romania.
    (AP, 6/14/13)

1955        May 14, Representatives from eight Communist bloc countries: Soviet Union, Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland & Romania, signed the Warsaw Pact in Poland. Andras Hegedues signed for Hungary.
    (AP, 5/14/97)(SFC, 10/26/99, p.B4)(MC, 5/14/02)

1964        Cytosine, produced under the brand name Tabex, was first marketed in Bulgaria. It was produced by the Bulgarian pharmaceutical company Sopharma AD and became widely available in the Formerly Socialist Economies of Europe (FSE). The cytisine derivative varenicline was approved in 2006 as a smoking cessation drug.
    (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytisine)

1968        Aug 3, The Bratislava statement conceded Czechoslovakia’s right to pursue its own path. The conference was held in Bratislava, Slovakia, for representatives of the communist and workers' parties of the People's Republic of Bulgaria, the Hungarian People's Republic, the German Democratic Republic, the Polish People's Republic, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic.
    (WUD, 1994, p.1687)(http://library.thinkquest.org/C001155/documents/doc41.htm)

1969        Georgi Markov, a renowned writer and journalist, fled communist Bulgaria and settled in London, where he worked for the Bulgarian-language service of the British Broadcasting Corp.
    (AP, 6/16/05)

1971        May 18, The 3rd Bulgarian constitution went into effect.
    (www.servat.unibe.ch/icl/bu00000_.html)

1971        Jul 4, In Bulgaria Marin Naidenov Minkov (1914-2012) was named Patriarch of the country’s Orthodox Christians.
    (AP, 11/6/12)

1972        Communist Party officials told Muslim men to change their names to something more Bulgarian. A protest in Breznitsa left 8 dead.
    (SFC, 3/27/00, p.A12)

1977        Bulgaria’s foreign minister Petar Mladenov became a member of the policy-making Politburo.
    (SFC, 6/2/00, p.D5)

1978        Sep 6, Bulgarian defector Georgi Markov, living in London, was stabbed in the leg by a man carrying an umbrella; Markov died four days later, an apparent victim of the Bulgarian secret police using a ricin-coated pellet. The assassin was later identified as Francesco Gullino (Guillino, Giullino), code name Piccadilly, an Italian-born Dane, operating under instructions from Vasil Kotsev, Bulgaria’s top spymaster.
    (AP, 9/7/08)(Econ, 9/6/08, p.61)

1978        Sep 11, Georgi Markov, a Bulgarian defector, died at a British hospital four days after being stabbed by a man wielding a poisoned umbrella tip. British investigative reporter Peter Earle (d.1997 at 71) revealed that Markov was jabbed by an East German agent with a poison tipped umbrella on Waterloo Bridge. The original report stated that Markov died of a heart attack. In 1993 Danish authorities charged a Dane of Italian origin, Francesco Guillino, with killing Markov. Guillino, who reportedly had worked for the Bulgarian secret services since 1972, denied any wrongdoing and eventually was freed. In 2005 journalist Hristo Hristov authored “Kill Vagabond," in which he presented new evidence confirming that the hit was planned and carried out by Bulgaria's communist-era secret service.
    (SFEC, 4/27/97, p.B8)(AP, 9/11/98)(AP, 6/16/05)(SFC, 6/17/05, p.W5)

1980        In 1980, Konstantin Pavlov (1933-2008), Bulgarian poet and screenwriter, was granted the Grand Prix at the Karlovy Vary film festival for his screenplay of the film "Illusion."
    (AP, 9/30/08)

1981        Elias Canetti (1905-1994), Bulgarian-born British novelist and essayist, won the Nobel Prize in Literature. His ancestors were Sephardic Jews who had been expelled from Spain in 1492.
    (AP, 10/8/09)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elias_Canetti)
1981        The Bulgarian communist regime built the Buzludzha Monument on a 1,441-meter-high peak to commemorate events in 1891 when the socialists led by Dimitar Blagoev assembled secretly in the area to form an organized socialist movement.
    (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buzludzha)

1983-2002    Bulgaria experienced an average of 7.4 self-immolations a year during this period, most of them politically motivated.
    (Econ, 3/23/13, p.60)

1988        Dec 27, Bulgaria stopped jamming Radio Free Europe after more than 3 decades.
    (http://tinyurl.com/jh6vq)

1989        Nov 10, In Bulgaria Communist ruler Todor Zhivkov (1911-1998) was thrown out of office after a 35-year dictatorship. The ouster was led by Foreign Minister Petar Mladenov who later became president.
    (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Todor_Zhivkov)(SFC, 11/29/96, p.B3)(SFC, 5/2/97, p.A14)

1989        To avoid assimilation 300,000 Turks left Bulgaria.
    (SFC, 9/9/96, p.A11)

1989        Bulgaria’s new government apologized for "crimes of the past" and rescinded the 1972 Communist law for Muslim men to change their names.
    (SFC, 3/27/00, p.A12)

1990        Feb 3, The parliament of Bulgaria elected economist Andrei Lukanov to replace a hard-line Communist as premier. Lukanov became the prime minister after rising to the number 2 spot of the Communist hierarchy under Zhivkov. He oversaw the party’s formal break with Stalinism and victory in the first free elections.
    (SFC, 10/5/96, p.A10)(AP, 2/3/00)   

1990        Jun, Bulgaria’s former Communist Party, renamed the Socialist party, won parliamentary elections.
    (SFC, 5/2/97, p.A14)

1990        Jul, Bulgaria’s Pres. Petar Mladenov resigned under pressure from the anti-communist opposition.
    (SFC, 6/2/00, p.D5)

1990        Nov, Bulgaria’s Andrei Lukanov fell from power under a wave of protests and strikes.
    (SFC, 10/5/96, p.A10)

1990        Dec, Bulgaria’s Socialist dominated Parliament formed a coalition government headed by nonparty lawyer Dimitar Popov. It included the opposition Union of Democratic Forces (UDF).
    (SFC, 5/2/97, p.A14)

1990        The body of Georgi Dimitrov was removed from its mausoleum in Sophia and cremated.
    (SFC, 9/10/99, p.A12)

1990-1997    Bulgaria’s Socialist Party drove the country to the brink of bankruptcy.
    (SFC, 6/18/01, p.A10)

1991        Bulgaria’s .UDF won a modest majority in parliament in the fall, but its government was ousted in a no-confidence vote after 11 months in power.
    (SFC, 5/2/97, p.A14)

1991        In Bulgaria Albena Simeonova established the Foundation for Ecological Training and Education.
    (USAT, 4/22/96, p.4-D)

1992        Bulgaria’s Communist leader Todor Zhivkov was convicted of embezzling state funds. He was freed in 1997.
    (WSJ, 1/21/97, p.A1)

1993        Jun 28, Boris Christoff (b.1914), Bulgaria born bass singer, died in Rome.
    (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_Christoff)

1993        In Bulgaria Albena Simeonova established the environmental group Green Parliament.
    (USAT, 4/22/96, p.4-D)

1993        Bulgaria banned dancing bears, but performances continued through 2002. In 2000 Four Paws, a Vienna animal rights group, opened a bear sanctuary at Belitsa.
    (SFC, 7/8/02, p.A3)

1994        Dec 18, Bulgaria’s Socialist Party (ex-communist) won a parliamentary election. Premier Zhan Videnov’s Socialist government won a parliamentary majority.
    (www.projects.v2.nl/~arns/Texts/Chrono/BG.html)(SFC, 6/6/96, p.C5)

1994        Arms exports from Bulgaria generated about $250 mil., a three-fold increase over a year earlier.
    (WSJ, 7/24/95, p.A-7c)

1994        Emil Kuylev (1956-2005), a former police officer, founded the Bulgarian-Russian Rosexim bank and acquired in 2002 the state insurance company DZI, making his business into the largest banking and insurance firm in Bulgaria.
    (AP, 10/26/05)
   
1995        Dec, Bulgaria's Parliament endorsed the government's decision to apply for full membership to the European Union.
    (WSJ, 12/4/95, p.A-8)

1996        Apr 22, Albena Simeonova, founder of Green Parliament in Bulgaria was a Goldman Award winner for her campaigning against nuclear power and other environmental issues.
    (USAT, 4/22/96, p.4-D)

1996        May 21, Bulgaria's PM Zhan Videnov was struggling to keep the country’s economy intact. The local currency, the lev, slumped to 116 leva to the dollar.
    (WSJ, 5/21/96, p.A-12)

1996        May 25, King Simeon returned to Bulgaria. He may run for president but must get waived constitutional requirement that candidates must have been residents for the previous 5 years. He was forced into exile by the communist rulers at age 9.
    (SFC, 5/26/96, p.C-11)

1996        Jun 6, Bulgaria's currency was plummeting and crime was rampant. People were dispirited and the official economy was 90% state-owned and under management by former Communists. Pres. Zhelyu Zhelev doubted whether the Socialist Party would be able to rescue the country.
    (SFC, 6/6/96, C2,5)

1996        Jun 14, Bulgaria passed legislation to give joint ventures at least 50% foreign owned a five year tax holiday, and required that half of the forgiven tax sums be invested in the same businesses.
    (WSJ, 6/14/96, p.A10)

1996        Jun, The average monthly wages in Bulgaria fell to about $65 from $122 in May.
    (WSJ, 8/19/96, p.A7C)

1996        Jul 1, In Bulgaria there was sharp increases in taxes, excise duties and electricity and fuel prices.
    (SFC, 7/2/96, p.A10)

1996        Jul, Bulgaria reached an agreement with the IMF and $582 million was pumped in with another $200 million promised by the World Bank.
    (WSJ, 8/19/96, p.A7C)

1996        Jul, Inflation in Bulgaria hit 23% for the month.
    (SFC, 9/9/96, p.A11)

1996        Aug 11, Vangelia Gushterova (84), a blind peasant woman with supposed clairvoyant powers, died in Bulgaria of cancer.
    (SFC, 8/12/96, p.C5)

1996        Oct 2, In Bulgaria former PM Andrei Lukanov was assassinated. It was said that he had new proofs of corruption in the highest power circles. In 2003 5 men were convicted and sentenced to life in prison without chance of parole.
    (SFC, 10/5/96, p.A10)(AP, 11/28/03)

1996        Oct 27, Bulgaria's anti-Communist opposition candidate, Petar Stoyanov, led the elections against Ivan Marazov with 44% vs. 27%.
    (SFC, 10/28/96, p.A10)

1996        Nov 3, In Bulgaria’s presidential elections Petar Stoyanov (44) won with 61.9% of the vote.
    (SFC, 11/4/96, p.A11)

1996        Bulgaria’s GDP fell 10% and foreign debt went up to more than $9 billion, equal to the size of the economy. Wages have fallen to $20 per month from 120.
    (WSJ, 2/28/97, p.A1)

1997        Jan 8, Bulgaria’s ruling party backed Nikolai Dobrev for premier.
    (WSJ, 1/9/97, p.A1)

1997        Jan 10, In Bulgaria protestors trapped legislators of the ruling Socialist Party inside parliament. The economy was still 90% state-owned and inflation last year topped 300%.
    (SFC, 1/11/96, p.A8)

1997        Jan 19, Bulgaria’s Pres. Peter Stoyanov was sworn into office and he immediately called for new parliamentary elections.
    (SFC, 1/20/96, p.A13)

1997        Feb 3, Bulgaria's Premier designate Nikolai Dobrev was selected by the Bulgaria’s Socialists to lead a new government. Thousands hit the streets with students and transport workers in protest.
    (SFC, 2/4/97, p.A9)

1997        Feb 4, Bulgaria’s ex-Communists backed down and agreed to new elections in April.
    (WSJ, 2/5/97, p.A1)

1997        Apr 19, In Bulgaria the United Democratic Forces (UDF) under Ivan Kostov won elections with 52% of the vote. The former Communist’s renamed Socialist Party won 19%.
    (SFEC, 4/21/97, p.A8)

1997        May 2, Bulgaria’s average salary was reported as $30 a month and the average pension $4 a month.
    (SFC, 5/2/97, p.A18)

1997        May 21, In Bulgaria Ivan Kostov was elected the new premiere by the parliament. He planned reforms for the economy, cleanup of corruption, and gaining admission to the EU and NATO.
    (SFC, 5/22/97, p.C3)

1998        Nov 23, An Arctic cold wave was reported to have killed 71 people across Europe over the last 3 days. 36 deaths were in Poland and 24 in Romania and Bulgaria.
    (SFC, 11/24/98, p.A14)

1999        Mar 26, In Bulgaria some 10,000 people protested NATO strikes; in Greece some 15,000 marched on the US embassy in protest; in Bosnia some 3,000 Serb youths turned violent in Banja Luka over the NATO strikes.
    (SFC, 3/27/99, p.A11)

1999        Apr 18, NATO requested from Bulgaria the use of its airspace.
    (WSJ, 4/19/99, p.A1)

1999        Apr 20, Bulgaria and Romania offered to let NATO use their airspace to bomb Yugoslavia.
    (WSJ, 4/21/99, A22)

1999        Apr 29, In Bulgaria an errant NATO HARM missile hit a home in Gorna Banya on the outskirts of Sofia. There were no casualties.
    (SFC, 4/30/99, p.A13,D2)

1999        Jun 30, In Bulgaria finance minister Muravei Radev announced that 40% of state assets would be sold and dozens of companies closed.
    (SFC, 7/1/99, p.A15)

1999        Aug 21, In Bulgaria a planned explosion in Sophia of the mausoleum that once housed the body of former Communist leader Georgi Dimitrov failed to collapse the structure. It took a week to collapse the structure.
    (SFEC, 8/22/99, p.A18)(SFC, 9/10/99, p.A12)

1999        Nov 10, Communism ended in Bulgaria and the country began its transition to democracy.
    (AP, 11/10/13)

1999        Nov 22, Pres. Clinton visited Bulgaria and promised more aid if the economy stabilized and the movement toward democracy continued.
    (SFC, 11/23/99, p.A14)

1999        Dec 10, The EU granted preliminary consideration for membership to Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, and Malta.
    (SFC, 12/11/99, p.A16)

1999        Bulgaria cut 3 zeroes from its currency.
    (Econ, 8/28/04, p.67)

1999        Bulgaria agreed with the EU to close the two oldest reactors in the Kozlodui nuclear power plant by the end of 2006 because of safety concerns. 2 newer 1,000-megawatt reactors were to stay running until the next decade.
    (AP, 10/9/06)

1999        Bulgaria privatized the troubled Kremikovtzi steel plant selling 71% to businessman Valentin Zahariev for one dollar and a promise to rehabilitate the plant.
    (WSJ, 8/4/08, p.A8)

2000        May 31, Petar Mladenov, former Bulgarian president (1989-1990), died at age 64.
    (SFC, 6/2/00, p.D5)

2001        Apr 23, It was reported that Simeon Borisov Saxe-Coburgotski, the former Czar Simeon II of Bulgaria, had recently announced plans to form a political party.
    (SFC, 4/23/01, p.A8)

2001        Apr, Customs agents in Bulgaria confiscated a transport plane from the Czech Republic with 6 howitzers and a cache of AK-47 rifles. The plane was scheduled to go to Georgia but had flight plans for Eritrea.
    (WSJ, 12/11/01, p.A15)

2001        Jun 17, In Bulgaria voters in parliamentary elections supported the national Movement of Czar Simeon II (64), who was eligible to become prime minister. PM Ivan Kostov conceded. Simeon’s party won 120 of 240 seats.
    (SFC, 6/18/01, p.A10)(SFC, 7/13/01, p.A14)

2001        Jul 12, In Bulgaria Simeon Saxe-Coburgotski (64), the former King Simeon II, was chosen as Prime Minister. He promised to solve the country's problems in 800 days.
    (SFC, 7/13/01, p.A14)(Econ, 11/1/03, p.46)

2001        Dec 21, In Sofia, Bulgaria, at least 7 young people were killed when they rushed the entrance of a downtown disco.
    (SFC, 12/22/01, p.A5)

2001        In Bulgaria Socialist Georgi Parvanov (44) won 53% of the presidential vote against incumbent Petar Stoyanov. This signaled discontent with the pace of reforms of PM Simeon Saxcoburggotski.
    (SFC, 11/19/01, p.A14)(WSJ, 11/19/01, p.A1)

2002        May 23, Pope John Paul II visited Bulgaria, his 1st to the Orthodox nation of just 80,000 thousand Catholics.
    (SFC, 5/24/02, p.A13)

2002        May 31, Bulgaria signed an agreement with the US to destroy its Cold War-era missiles. The US planned to pay the costs of destruction.
    (SFC, 6/1/02, p.A11)

2002        Jun 9, The Bulgaria Socialist Party re-elected Sergei Stanishev (35), its young, reformist leader, in a landslide victory for the social democratic wing of the party over aging communist hard-liners.
    (AP, 6/9/02)

2002        Oct 9, The European Union's executive Commission declared Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, and Slovakia nearly ready for EU membership and recommended they be invited to join in 2004. Romania and Bulgaria likely will be delayed until 2007 because of weak economies, the Commission said, adding Turkey was the weakest link among candidates.
    (AP, 10/9/02)

2002        Nov 21, The Baltic nations of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania joined former communist states Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia as the next wave of NATO states.
    (AP, 11/21/02)

2003        Mar 7, In Bulgaria Ilya Pavlov, owner of the energy and tourism-related company Multigroup and Bulgaria's richest man, was killed by a sniper in Sofia. Pavlov, a former wrestler, was instrumental in the demise of the Kremikovtzi steel plant.
    (AP, 10/26/05)(http://tinyurl.com/hju8l)(WSJ, 8/4/08, p.A8)

2003        Nov 28, In Bulgaria 5 men were convicted and sentenced to life in prison without chance of parole for the 1996 assassination of former Prime Minister Andrei Lukanov.
    (AP, 11/28/03)

2003        Dec 24, It was reported that U.S. and Russian experts recovered 37 pounds of weapons-grade uranium, enough to develop a nuclear warhead, from a closed atomic facility in Bulgaria.
    (AP, 12/24/03)

2003        Dec 27, In Iraq insurgents launched 3 coordinated attacks in the southern city of Karbala, killing 12 people, including six Iraqi police officers, 2 Thai soldiers and 5 Bulgarians.
    (AP, 12/27/03)(AP, 12/28/03)(SSFC, 12/28/03, p.A3)(WSJ, 12/29/03, p.A1)

2004        Jan 2, Bulgaria reported that more than two dozen Bulgarian soldiers are refusing deployment in Iraq, following the deaths of five countrymen.
    (AP, 1/2/04)

2004        Mar 29, Pres. Bush hosted a White House ceremony to welcome Bulgaria, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia into the NATO alliance.
    (WSJ, 3/30/04, p.A1)

2004        Mar, The population of Bulgaria was about 7.9 million, down from 8.9 million in 1989.
    (WPR, 3/04, p.28)

2004        Apr 2, In Brussel an official ceremony welcomed Bulgaria, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia into the NATO alliance.
    (SFC, 4/3/04, p.A11)

2004        May 3, Bulgaria sent 24 of its soldiers home after they complained about being unprepared for duty in Iraq.
    (AP, 5/3/04)

2004        Jul 14, Militants in Iraq said they killed a captive Bulgarian truck driver and threatened to put another hostage to death in 24 hours. Georgi Lazov (30) and Ivaylo Kepov (32) were kidnapped Jun 29.
    (AP, 7/14/04)(USAT, 7/4/04, p.5A)

2004        Sep 30, Bulgaria adopted changes to its criminal justice system to meet EU demands for joining the group in 2007.
    (WSJ, 10/4/04, p.A15)

2004        Dec 7, Libya listed three conditions under which it is prepared to drop charges against five Bulgarian nurses condemned to death on suspect charges of spreading AIDS.
    (AFP, 12/8/04)

2004        Dec 28, Albania, Bulgaria and Macedonia gave political support to a $1.2 billion private trans-Balkan pipeline that will allow Russian and Caspian crude oil to avoid Turkish waters.
    (WSJ, 12/29/04, p.A7)

2005        Jan 1, Bulgaria was forecast for 4% GDP growth with a population at 7.7 million and GDP per head at $3,590.
    (Econ, 1/8/05, p.87)

2005        Jan 21, Bulgarian President Georgy Parvanov told parliament that he would like to see Bulgaria's 450-strong troop contingent out of Iraq before the end of the year.
    (AFP, 1/21/05)

2005        Feb, Bulgaria’s parliament passed a law authorizing the confiscation of illegally obtained assets. Widespread money laundering had manifested itself in a construction boom in tourist areas and other sudden explosions of wealth. The audacity of the crime bosses, who intimidate normal Bulgarians with their gun-toting entourages, has angered many and may play a role in whether Saxe-Coburg will hold on to power in summer elections.
    (AP, 4/3/05)

2005        Mar 4, In Iraq Pvt. Gardi Gardev, a Bulgarian soldier, was killed by friendly fire." President Georgi Parvanov summoned U.S. Ambassador James Pardew on Mar 7 and complained about the lack of coordination between coalition troops in Iraq.
    (AP, 3/7/05)

2005        Apr 13, The European Parliament approved the entry of Bulgaria and Romania into the EU in 2007, but it said both countries still need to carry out necessary reforms.
    (AP, 4/13/05)

2005        May 28, Bulgarian President Georgi Parvanov flew Tripoli to meet with Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi, days before a Libyan court rules on the appeal of five Bulgarian nurses sentenced to death over an AIDS-tainted blood scandal.
    (Reuters, 5/27/05)

2005        Jun 25, Bulgarians voted in general elections. The ex-communist Socialist party was expected to see the Socialists topple ex-king PM Simeon Saxe-Coburg and take over the tough task of steering the country into the EU in 2007.
    (Reuters, 6/25/05)

2005        Jun 26, In Bulgaria with 99.6% of the votes counted, the Socialists had 31% of the vote, while the ruling center-right National Movement of PM Simeon Saxcoburggotski had 20%. The Movement for rights and Freedoms, a party for ethnic Turks, won 13%.
    (AP, 6/26/05)(WSJ, 6/27/05, p.A12)(Econ, 7/2/05, p.46)

2005        Jul 15, Officials said heavy rains and flash floods have killed 20 people and inundated tens of thousands of homes in Bulgaria and Romania.
    (AP, 7/15/05)

2005        Aug 15, Bulgaria's three largest parties formed a coalition under a Socialist prime minister, resolving seven weeks of stalemate threatening to hold up the Balkan state's aspirations for EU entry in 2007.
    (AP, 8/15/05)

2005        Aug 16, Bulgaria's Parliament overwhelmingly approved historian Sergei Stanishev (39), the leader of the Socialist Party, as the country's new prime minister bringing to power his socialist-liberal coalition government.
    (AP, 8/16/05)

2005        Aug 17, Libya called on the Bulgarian government to negotiate a payment to win amnesty for five Bulgarian medics and a Palestinian sentenced to death for allegedly infecting 400 children with the AIDS virus.
    (AP, 8/18/05)

2005        Aug, Georgy Iliev, owner of a Bulgarian First League football club and brother of the founder of the VIS security-guard business that was banned for racketeering, was shot down in a bar he owned.
    (AP, 10/26/05)

2005        Sep 2, Bulgaria said it has begun preparations to withdraw its 400 troops from Iraq.
    (AP, 9/2/05)

2005        Oct 10, Shinka Manova, a high-ranking Bulgarian customs official, was slain in Sofia. He was allegedly protecting the smuggling business of the mafia.
    (AP, 10/26/05)

2005        Oct 14, Bulgaria adopted a new penal procedure to remedy a judiciary system that has been criticized for failing to jail well-known criminals.
    (AP, 10/26/05)

2005        Oct 26, Emil Kyulev (49) owner of Bulgaria's largest insurance and banking group, DZI-Rosexim, was shot dead in the street in Sofia in the latest in a series of killings to jolt the country, which has been told to crack down on organized crime if it wants to join the EU.
    (AP, 10/26/05)(Econ, 10/29/05, p.50)

2005        Dec 23, Bulgaria and Libya agreed to set up a special fund for AIDS-infected children in Libya, where five Bulgarian nurses face the death penalty after being convicted of causing the infections.
    (AP, 12/23/05)

2005        Dec 25, Libya's Supreme Court scrapped death sentences against five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor and ordered a retrial of the cases which have harmed Tripoli's efforts to build ties with the West.
    (Reuters, 12/25/05)

2005        Dec 27, Ukraine and Bulgaria said all their troops had left Iraq. Poland said it would remain but reduce its number of troops by 600 next year.
    (AP, 12/27/05)

2005        In Bulgaria businessman Valentin Zahariev sold the troubled Kremikovtzi steel plant for $110 million to Pramod Mittal, the brother of steel magnate Lakshmi Mittal.
    (WSJ, 8/4/08, p.A8)

2005        Bulgaria’s GDP per head was $3,480.
    (Econ, 1/6/07, p.43)

2006        Jan 6, Bulgarian officials said Gazprom was pushing it to switch to a system in which it pays transit fees and charges Sofia market prices. Bulgaria rejected the offer and said its current is good to 2010.
    (WSJ, 1/9/06, p.A11)

2006        Jan 21, The families of 426 HIV-infected Libyan children asked for $12 million in compensation for each child as part of efforts to resolve the case of five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor charged with intentionally infecting the children.
    (AP, 1/22/06)

2006        Jan, Hewlett-Packard announced that it will open a global delivery service center in Sofia, Bulgaria, in June with some 1000 Bulgarian employees.
    (SFC, 5/16/06, p.C1)(http://iinbulgaria.com/newsletter/html/biin-37.html)

2006        Feb 22, Bulgaria's parliament endorsed a government decision to send a 120-member non-combat unit to Iraq.
    (AP, 2/22/06)

2006        Mar 24, Officials said Bulgaria and the US have reached an agreement allowing the US military to use several military bases in Bulgaria.
    (AP, 3/24/06)

2006        Apr 13, The Danube reached record-high levels in Bulgaria, Romania and Serbia, flooding fertile farmland as authorities in southeastern Europe considered ordering evacuations.
    (AP, 4/13/06)

2006        Apr 27, Thousands of Bulgarians demonstrated against a deal to allow US troops to use military facilities in the country.
    (AP, 4/27/06)

2006        Apr 28, In Bulgaria Secretary Rice signed a Defense Cooperation Agreement, which included a US lease of 3 bases in Bulgaria.
    (www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/pix/2006/65423.htm)(Econ, 6/24/06, p.62)

2006        May 26, In Bulgaria lawmakers overwhelmingly approved an agreement allowing US troops to use Bulgarian military facilities.
    (AP, 5/26/06)

2006        May 30, In Bulgaria more than 10,000 people protested in the streets of Sofia to demand changes in the government's economic and social policy, which they blame for the country's rising cost of living.
    (AP, 5/30/06)

2006        Sep 26, The European Commission recommended that Bulgaria and Romania join the EU next year, but under some of the harshest terms ever faced by new members.
    (AP, 9/26/06)

2006        Oct 2, Vladimir Kramnik of Russia and Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria played to a draw in Game 6 of the world chess championship after Kramnik agreed to resume competition after a dispute over bathroom breaks threatened to halt the tournament.
    (AP, 10/3/06)

2006        Oct 22, Bulgarians voted for the president who will lead their country into the EU. Incumbent Georgi Parvanov won 64% of the vote against his main rival, ultranationalist Volen Siderov. Turnout was only 38% of Bulgaria's 6.4 million eligible voters, short of the 50% required by law to allow Parvanov to avoid a runoff. Most power in Bulgaria rests with the prime minister and parliament. But the president does have veto powers, giving him the right to send any bill back to parliament. He also represents the state abroad, leads the armed forces and can sign international treaties. The president is elected for a term of five years, renewable only once. The runoff was set for Oct 29.
    (AP, 10/22/06)(WSJ, 10/24/06, p.A1)

2006        Oct 24, Britain said Bulgarians and Romanians will have only limited rights to work in Britain for at least a year after their countries join the European Union on January 1.
    (AP, 10/24/06)

2006        Oct 29, Bulgarian President Georgy Parvanov won re-election to a second five-year term with an unassailable lead in his run-off battle against ultra-nationalist challenger Volen Siderov. Turnout was between 35 and 40%.
    (AP, 10/29/06)

2006        Oct 30, A Russian company won a bid to construct a second nuclear plant in Bulgaria.
    (AP, 10/31/06)

2006        Nov 15, In Bulgaria Bozhidar Doychev, the director of the department responsible for communist-era archives, was found dead at his desk, shot with his own gun. Lawmakers had recently voted to open the archives.
    (Econ, 12/23/06, p.74)(www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread234270/pg)

2006        Dec 6, Lawmakers in Bulgaria adopted a much-delayed law to open the archives of its former communist secret service, but also voted to keep a small portion of the files secret for "national security reasons."
    (AP, 12/6/06)

2006        Dec 7, In northeastern Bulgaria a truck collided with a bus, sending both vehicles off a bridge into a river and killing at least 17 people.
    (AP, 12/8/06)

2006        Dec 19, A Libya court convicted five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor of deliberately infecting 400 children with HIV and sentenced them to death, despite scientific evidence the youngsters had the virus before the medical workers came to Libya. The verdict, which will be automatically referred to Libya's Supreme Court, drew quick condemnation from European nations. The six later had their death sentences commuted, and were transferred to Bulgaria, where they were pardoned and set free.
    (AP, 12/19/06)(AP, 12/19/07)

2006        Dec 31, In Bulgaria 2 Chernobyl-era nuclear energy units were shut down at Kozloduy as an accession to Bulgaria’s joining the EU. This led to a cut in energy exports and to soaring energy prices in the Balkans.
    (Econ, 2/10/07, p.51)(http://tinyurl.com/2oyyok)

2007        Jan 1, Bulgaria and Romania joined the EU. Some 30,000 Israelis gained EU citizenship due to their dual registration in Romania.
    (WSJ, 10/4/07, p.A11)(AP, 1/1/07)

2007        Mar 2, Bulgaria's Socialist-led government survived a no-confidence on a motion filed by the opposition, claiming that the government was unable to cope with a health care crisis.
    (AP, 3/2/07)

2007        Mar 15, Bulgaria, Russia and Greece signed a deal in Athens to build a 175-mile pipeline to transport Russian oil to a port in northern Greece.
    (AP, 3/15/07)

2007        May 20, An exit poll showed that Bulgaria's ruling Socialist party won the country's first elections for the European Parliament with 23.9% of votes, despite voter frustration with rampant corruption and poverty.
    (AP, 5/20/07)

2007        May 27, A Libyan court acquitted 5 Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian medic of charges of slandering policemen by protesting that their confessions had been extracted under torture.
    (AFP, 5/27/07)

2007        Jun 2, Bulgarian PM Sergey Stanishev said he had accepted the resignation of two ministers, following a corruption scandal that has shaken his centre-left government.
    (AP, 6/2/07)

2007        Jun 11, Pres. Bush arrived in Bulgaria and met with President Georgi Parvanov.
    (AP, 6/11/07)

2007        Jun 15, Activists in Bulgaria bought the freedom of the country’s last three dancing bears. They will get to rest their paws at a mountain sanctuary, in an apparent end to the centuries-old performance tradition in the Balkans. Bears had still performed, even though the practice was outlawed in 1993, when there were 20 to 30 such bears in the country.
    (AP, 6/15/07)

2007        Jul 11, Manol Velev, a Bulgarian businessman, was shot and left in a coma. Velev was married to Bulgaria’s sports minister and had paid for the 2006 re-election campaign of Pres. Georgi Parvanov. Velev was released from the hospital on December 6, 2007 and faced extensive rehabilitation.
    (http://paper.standartnews.com/en/article.php?d=2007-12-06&article=9058)(Econ, 8/11/07, p.42)

2007        Jul 17, Libya's foreign minister said the death sentences for five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor accused of infecting hundreds of Libyan children with HIV have been commuted to life in prison. The ruling came after the families of the children each received $1 million and agreed to drop their demand for the execution of the six.
    (AP, 7/17/07)

2007        Jul 24, Five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor, sentenced to life in prison in Libya for allegedly infecting children with HIV, came home to Bulgaria and were greeted with tears and hugs, and a presidential pardon that allowed them to walk free after 8 1/2 years behind bars. French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Qatar mediated the release and hinted the Gulf country may have had a broader role in resolving the crisis.
    (AP, 7/24/07)

2007        Jul 28, Libya said the Czech Republic, Qatar and Bulgaria contributed to an international fund to support hundreds of children who contracted HIV at a Libyan hospital in the 1990s. Libya also denounced a decision by Bulgaria's president to pardon six medics from life jail terms in an AIDS case as a "betrayal" and an "illegal procedure."
    (Reuters, 7/28/07)(AFP, 7/28/07)

2007        Aug 2, Bulgaria said it had decided to write off Libya's communist-era debt as a contribution to an international fund for the victims of an AIDS epidemic blamed by Tripoli on six Bulgarian medics.
    (AP, 8/2/07)

2007        Sep 3, Bulgaria donated $56.6 million in Soviet-era debt owned by Libya as its contribution to a deal that led to the release of six medics convicted of infecting Libyan children with HIV.
    (AP, 9/3/07)

2007        Oct 28, Bulgarians voted in municipal elections that attracted a record number of candidates given the scheduled influx of millions of euros in EU funding over the next few years. The vote will prove a mid-term test for the ruling centre-left coalition government of PM Sergey Stanishev.
    (AP, 10/28/07)

2007        Nov 23, Bulgaria’s Interior Ministry said police have arrested nine people and broke a huge counterfeiting ring that churned out foreign passports and other documents and distributed them across Europe.
    (AP, 11/23/07)

2007        Dec 12, A new report said the trafficking of Bulgarian women as sex slaves brings in about 1.8 billion euros ($2.6 billion) a year for the gangs behind it, making it the country's most profitable criminal activity.
    (AP, 12/12/07)
2007        Dec 12, Ashraf Juma Hajuj, the Palestinian-born doctor held with five Bulgarian nurses in a Libyan prison for over eight years, filed suit in Paris against Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi for torture. The six medics, who always maintained their innocence, said they were subjected to torture, including beatings, electric shocks, food and sleep deprivation, and even sexual abuse, in order to confess to their alleged crime.
    (AFP, 12/13/07)

2007        Georgi Parvanov, president of Bulgaria, was named as a collaborator with communist secret services. He said he was approached to edit a book and did not realize he was dealing with spooks.
    (Econ, 5/31/08, SR p.13)
2007        In Bulgaria Delyan Peevski was fired as a deputy minister of emergency situations in a corruption scandal. He was eventually cleared after an investigation established no wrongdoing, however, and was reinstated in the post. Peevski and his mother, Irena Krasteva, control a network of national newspapers and television channels.
    (AP, 6/14/13)

2008        Jan 18, Russian President Vladimir Putin clinched a key pipeline deal with Bulgaria that strengthens Moscow's grip on European gas markets before issuing a stern warning about the future status of Kosovo.
    (AP, 1/18/08)

2008        Feb 28, In Bulgaria a night train traveling from Sofia to the northeastern town of Kardam caught fire. Officials said at least eight people died, adding that the toll could rise.
    (AP, 2/29/08)

2008        Apr 4, A Bulgarian official revealed that the country's communist-era border troops killed East Germans and others who tried to get to the West by sneaking across this Balkan country's borders during the Cold War. Documents detailed at least two cases in which citizens of then communist East Germany were killed, one in 1974 and one in 1988. Archives also showed that 22 Bulgarians were shot while trying to escape to Greece or Turkey between 1964 and 1967.
    (AP, 4/5/08)

2008        Apr 7, In Bulgaria gunmen killed Georgy Stoyev, the country’s best-known author of books on the mafia. The night before, Borislav Georgiev, the chief executive of a large energy company, was killed in his apartment building with two bullets to the head.
    (http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5iOiGGOjL2rCkZuEhCa9kkLtaA5LA)

2008        Apr 13, Bulgaria's powerful Interior Minister Rumen Petkov resigned amid a snowballing corruption scandal that exposed links between top crime-busters and suspected criminals.
    (AP, 4/13/08)

2008        Jun 28, In Bulgaria extremists throwing rocks, bottles and gasoline bombs attacked the capital's first gay pride parade which included some 150 participants.
    (AP, 6/28/08)

2008        Jul 18, A report of the European Union Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) was leaked to the media. According the report, which was sent to Bulgarian Deputy Prime Minister Plugchieva two weeks ago, businessman Lyudmil Stoykov, who sponsored the president's election campaign, and his associate Mario Nikolov, who is a sponsor of Parvanov's Bulgarian Socialist Party, were involved in large-scale abuses of EU funds.
    (http://english.people.com.cn/90001/90777/90853/6452879.html)

2008        Jul 23, The European Commission froze almost euro500 million ($800 million) in aid to Bulgaria, citing corruption, organized crime, severe spending irregularities and alleged vote-buying in a country that only joined the EU last year.
    (AP, 7/23/08)

2008        Jul, Bulgarian prosecutors indicted Alexander Tomov, chief executive of the Kremikovtzi steel plant, for millions of euros that they say were transferred to a soccer club and then to offshore companies controlled by Tomov. The former politician had been hired by Pramod Mittal in August 2007 to stop the financial bleeding at the Kremikovtzi steel plant.
    (WSJ, 8/4/08, p.A8)

2008        Aug 6, A Bulgarian court declared the Kremikovtzi steel plant to be insolvent. Ukrainian billionaire Kostyantin Zhevago and Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal SA competed to take over the plant operations following the insolvency proceedings.
    (WSJ, 8/7/08, p.B2)

2008        Jul, Bulgaria’s population stood at about 7.5 million people, down from 10.5 million since the early 1990s.
    (Econ, 7/26/08, p.63)

2008        Sep 14, Archaeologist Georgi Kitov (b.1943), an expert on the treasure-rich Thracian culture of antiquity, died of a heart attack while excavating a temple in central Bulgaria.
    (AP, 9/19/08)

2008        Sep 28, Konstantin Pavlov (b.1933), Bulgarian poet and screenwriter, died. He was among the few Bulgarian intellectuals who dared to assert their professional independence during the 1945-89 communist regime. Some of his most popular volumes of poetry are "Sweet Agony" (1991), "The Murder of the Sleeping Man" (1992) and "A Long Time Ago..." (1998).
    (AP, 9/30/08)

2008        Nov 25, Bulgaria lost euro220 million ($286 million) in promised payments from the EU because of its failure to tackle corruption.
    (www.eubusiness.com/news-eu/1227620855.75/)

2008        Dec 17, Bulgaria's last 155 troops stationed in Iraq returned home. 13 Bulgarian soldiers and six civilians have died in Iraq since 2003. Bulgaria also has troops in international military missions in Afghanistan, Kosovo and Bosnia.
    (AP, 12/17/08)

2009        Jan 3, Russian gas flows to four European Union countries fell normal levels after Moscow cut off supplies to Ukraine in a pricing row with no talks in sight to resolve the dispute. Bulgaria's Bulgargaz joined energy firms in Poland, Romania and Hungary in saying they had noted falls in supply.
    (Reuters, 1/3/09)

2009        Jan 6, A natural gas crisis loomed over Europe, as a contract dispute between Russia and Ukraine shut off Russian gas supplies to six countries and reduced gas deliveries to several others. Bulgaria, Greece, Macedonia, Romania, Croatia and Turkey all reported a halt in gas shipments.
    (AP, 1/6/09)

2009        Jan 14, Russia and Ukraine wrangled over gas supplies again. Bulgaria and Slovakia, cut off by the row for a freezing week, launched missions to plead for Russian gas flow to be restored.
    (Reuters, 1/14/09)

2009        Jan 15, Bulgarians held a rally outside parliament for the second day to demand that their government resign because of alleged corruption and a deepening economic crisis.
    (AP, 1/15/09)

2009        Jan 20, In Belgium the “Entropa" art installation at the EU headquarters, by Czech artist David Cerny, covered up the part that showed Bulgaria as a squat toilet after protests from the aggrieved nation.
    (AP, 1/20/09)

2009        Feb 8, Voters in Switzerland approved an expanded labor deal with the European Union that allows Romanians and Bulgarians to work in the Alpine republic.
    (AP, 2/8/09)

2009        May 28, In Bulgaria a bus careered down a mountainside and plowed through pedestrians heading to a religious festival, killing at least 16 people and injuring at least 20.
    (AP, 5/28/09)

2009        Jun 7, Europe leaned to the right as tens of millions of people voted in European Parliament elections, with conservative parties favored in many countries against a backdrop of economic crisis. Center-right parties won the most seats in the election. Only 43% of 375 million eligible voters cast ballots. In Bulgaria the xenophobic Ataka party won 12% of the vote.
    (AP, 6/7/09)(Reuters, 6/8/09)(SFC, 6/8/09, p.A5)(Econ, 2/6/10, p.58)

2009        Jun 23, Bulgarian authorities detained  Agim Ceku (59), a former Kosovo prime minister (2006-2008), on an international arrest warrant issued by Interpol at Serbia's request. He is wanted for war crimes allegedly committed during the 1998-1999 war when he was military chief of the Kosovo Liberation Army, made up of ethnic Albanian guerrillas.
    (AP, 6/24/09)

2009        Jun, In Bulgaria Plamen Momchilov (46), a cherry farmer, was killed by cherry thieves as he tried to keep them out of his orchard. Later, nine thieves were arrested and confessed to beating Momchilov to death with sticks and shovel handles. They were sentenced to 99 years in prison but as of 2011 were free pending an appeal.
    (AP, 6/25/11)

2009        Jul 5, Bulgaria held parliamentary elections. The Conservative opposition center-right GERB party, led by ex-wrestler Boyko Borisov, won elections with 39.7% of the vote as voters punished the governing Socialists for failing to crack down on corruption.
    (Reuters, 7/5/09)(AP, 7/6/09)(Econ, 7/11/09, p.52)(Econ, 1/9/10, p.51)

2009        Jul 13, Turkey and four EU countries (Austria, Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary) formally agreed to route the Nabucco natural gas pipeline across their territories, pushing ahead with a US- and EU-backed attempt to make Europe less dependent on Russian gas.
    (AP, 7/13/09)(Econ, 7/18/09, p.47)

2009        Sep 5, The sightseeing boat Ilinden, carrying 55 Bulgarian tourists, sank in Lake Ohrid on Macedonia's western border, and 15 people drowned.
    (AP, 9/5/09)(AFP, 9/6/09)

2009        Sep 16, In Bulgaria Sport Minister Svilen Neikov ordered a probe after the numbers 4, 15, 23, 24, 35 and 42 were selected by a machine, in a different order, on consecutive draws televised live on Sept. 6 and Sept. 10. No one won the Sept. 6 draw, but 18 people guessed correctly in the Sept. 10 contest and each received 10,164 leva ($7,585, euro5,150) in prize money.
    (AP, 9/17/09)

2010        Jan 5, In Bulgaria gunmen shot dead Bobbie Tsankov, a popular radio show host and crime journalist, and critically injured two other men in a busy part of the capital, Sofia.
    (AP, 1/5/10)

2010        Jan 14, Hundreds of Bulgarians protested against planned legal amendments allowing mass monitoring of emails, electronic messages and phone calls to fight crime and corruption.
    (AP, 1/14/10)

2010        Apr, In Bulgaria former defense minister Nicolay Tsonev was arrested in a hospital as part of a broad crackdown against organized crime.
    (Econ, 5/29/10, p.54)

2010        May 4, Spain’s Interior Ministry said Spain has taken in a second former inmate from the Guantanamo Bay prison for terrorism suspects. Another Guantanamo detainee was sent to Bulgaria. This left about 181 prisoners at Guantanamo Bay prison.
    (AP, 5/4/10)(SFC, 5/5/10, p.A2)

2010        Jun 23, Bulgaria says it will send 65 more troops to the NATO-led force in Afghanistan in early September.
    (AP, 6/23/10)

2010        Jul 28, In Bulgaria archeologist Kazimir Popconstantinov found a box while digging under the alta of an early Christian church off the coast of Sozopol. The box bore an inscription with the name of St. John the Baptist and allegedly contained some of his bone fragments.
    (Econ, 8/21/10, p.43)

2010        Sep 9, The European Parliament called on France to suspend its expulsion of gypsies. The rare criticism of an EU state was backed by 337 lawmakers meeting in Strasbourg, France, with 245 opposed and 51 abstentions. To date France had deported 8,000 people to Romania and Bulgaria this year alone.
    (AP, 9/9/10)(Econ, 9/18/10, p.73)

2010        Bulgaria’s population was about 7.6 million and included a 750,000 Turkish minority.
    (Econ, 2/6/10, p.58)

2011        Jun 18, In Bulgaria nearly 1,000 marchers joined the fourth gay pride rally in Sofia. Gay pride rallies were also held in Croatia and Hungary. Hundreds of police were on duty to protect the marchers following calls by extremist groups to stop the demonstrations.
    (AP, 6/18/11)

2011        Jul 16, Bulgarian railway workers found seals on a train carriage door broken, and the door not properly closed. 64 unarmed missile warheads from the train transporting military equipment to Bulgaria from Romania were missing. The components were said to not be dangerous.
    (AP, 7/18/11)

2011        Oct 23, Bulgaria held elections. Rosen Plevneliev, the candidate of the ruling center-right GERB party, was favored to win in the presidential elections that tested the government's popularity and the EU nation's ability to overcome concerns about vote-buying and corruption. Plevneliev finished first with 40.11%, and Ivailo Kalfin of the opposition Socialist Party second with 28.96%. A run-off will take place on Oct 30. The winner will replace incumbent Georgi Parvanov, who was barred by law from seeking a third term in office.
    (AP, 10/23/11)(AP, 10/27/11)

2011        Oct 30, Bulgarians voted between Rosen Plevneliev (47), a member of the ruling center-right party, and Ivailo Kalfin (47), a leftist ex-foreign minister, in an election run-off for the presidency of the impoverished, corruption-plagued country. The president leads the armed forces and can veto legislation and sign international treaties. Plevneliev won the election with 52.56%. Socialist challenger Ivailo Kalfin took 47.44% and conceded defeat.
    (AP, 10/30/11)(AP, 10/31/11)

2012        Feb 3, The death toll from a severe cold spell in Eastern Europe rose to 222, including 101 in the Ukraine, 37 in Poland, 24 in Romania and 16 in Bulgaria.
    (AFP, 2/1/12)

2012        Feb 6, In southern Bulgaria a 2.5-meter (8-foot) flood hit 700 houses in the village of Bisser, near the Greek border, after the dam on the Ivanovo reservoir collapsed. 8 people were killed in the flooding and 10 others were missing.
    (AP, 2/6/12)

2012        Feb 7, Swollen rivers in Bulgaria and Greece burst their banks, leaving dozens of homes underwater. The Maritsa River to overflow its banks, leaving dozens of homes under water in the city of Svilengrad near the Greek border. In Greece the river Evros burst its banks near the country's northeastern border with Bulgaria.
    (AP, 2/7/12)

2012        Mar 29, In Bulgaria Massud Barzani, the leader of Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan, sought investment in the region's farming, health and construction sectors during a meeting with PM Boyko Borisov.
    (AFP, 3/29/12)

2012        May 18, Leaders of Bulgaria, Qatar and Turkey agreed to study joint infrastructure projects like the construction of a new motorway from Istanbul across Bulgaria.
    (AFP, 5/18/12)

2012        Jul 18, In Bulgaria a suicide attack at Burgas airport killed 5 Israeli tourists and a Bulgarian bus driver. Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu blamed Iran for the bomb blast. It was later confirmed that the suicide bomber did not act alone. In 2013 one alleged terrorist was identified as Australian citizen Meliad Farah (b.1980), also known as Hussein Hussein. The second was Canadian citizen Hassan El Hajj Hassan (b.1988). The bomber was later said to have been of Algerian origin and trained in camps in South Lebanon.
    (Reuters, 7/18/12)(AFP, 7/19/12)(SFC, 7/25/12, p.A2)(AP, 7/25/13)(Reuters, 4/7/14)

2012        Oct, In Bulgaria some 5,000 Roman items were put at the disposal at the National History Museum in Sofia. They were seized at a border crossing with Serbia, just few miles west of Ratiaria, an ancient Roman settlement threatened by looters.
    (AP, 10/26/12)

2012        Nov 6, In Bulgaria Patriarch Maxim (b.1914), as Marin Naidenov Minkov, died in Sofia. He weathered a revolt over his communist-era ties to lead the Balkan country's Orthodox Christians for more than 40 years.
    (AP, 11/6/12)

2012        Nov 30, It was reported that Bulgaria is offering citizenship to foreigners ready to invest at least half a million euros ($650,000).
    (AP, 11/30/12)

2012        Dec 9, Officials said 4 people have died in Croatia and 2 in Serbia as a result of blizzards in southwestern Europe over the weekend. The death toll in the region reached at least 9 people, with deaths in Bulgaria amd Kosovo, as the cold snap continued through the week.
    (AP, 12/9/12)(SFC, 12/15/12, p.A2)

2012        Dec 20, Authorities declared a state of emergency in northeastern Bulgaria as heavy snow and freezing temperatures are causing disruptions in both Bulgaria and Romania.
    (AP, 12/20/12)

2013        Jan 19, In Bulgaria Oktay Enimehmedov (25) tried to shoot a gas pistol at Ahmed Dogan (58), the leader of his country's ethnic Turkish political party, at a conference in Sofia. The gun failed to fire and Enimehmedov was wrestled to the ground and beaten.
    (AP, 1/22/13)

2013        Jan 29, In Bulgaria Zlatomir Ivanov (44), a convicted underworld boss, was shot and seriously wounded outside a courthouse in Sofia. His bodyguard managed to return fire but was wounded in the leg.
    (AP, 1/29/13)

2013        Feb 5, Bulgaria linked Lebanon's militant group Hezbollah to the bomb attack on a bus last July that killed five Israeli tourists. Two of the suspects linked to the bombing had entered the country with an Australian and a Canadian passport.
    (AP, 2/5/13)

2013        Feb 6, A top Bulgarian security official said the two living suspects behind a bus attack that killed five Israeli tourists in Bulgaria last year have been identified and both are now living in Lebanon.
    (AP, 2/6/13)

2013        Feb 16, Bulgaria’s PM Boiko Borisov fired Simeon Djankov, his finance minister and deputy prime minister. Djankov was unpopular for his austerity policies.
    (Econ, 2/23/13, p.52)

2013        Feb 20, Bulgaria's center-right government of PM Boiko Borisov resigned after days of violent protests fueled by outrage over rising energy costs, corruption and a general economic decline in what is already the EU's poorest nation. In early March Pres. Rosen Plevneliev announced a caretaker cabinet led by Marin Raykov.
    (AP, 2/20/13)(Econ, 3/23/13, p.60)

2013        Mar 14, Bulgaria's Christian Orthodox Church leader, Patriarch Neophyte, decried a recent wave of self-immolations and suicides after four people set themselves ablaze in the past month.
    (SFC, 3/15/13, p.A2)(http://tinyurl.com/b65z6h8)

2013        Mar 20, A Bulgarian man, Plamen Goranov (36), set himself on fire to protest poverty in his country, becoming the 6th to do so in a month.
    (SFC, 3/21/13, p.A2)(Econ, 3/23/13, p.60)

2013        May 12, Bulgarians voted in parliamentary elections. The center-right Citizens for Bulgaria's European Development party (GERB) of former PM Boiko Borisov won 31%, falling far short of winning a majority needed to form a government. with no willing partners to join a coalition. This left the second-place (27%) opposition Bulgarian Socialist Party (DPS) in position to lead a new government.
    (AP, 5/12/13)(AP, 5/13/13)(Econ, 5/18/13, p.60)

2013        May 18, Russia's Sergey Karjakin won the €100,000 ($130,000) Norway chess championship after drawing against Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria.
    (AP, 5/18/13)

2013        May, Bulgaria’s unemployment was at 13-14%, up from 6% in 2007.
    (Econ, 5/18/13, p.60)

2013        Jun 14, The Bulgarian parliament's quick appointment of legislator and media mogul Delyan Peevski (33) to head the country's security service sparked massive protests and prompted the president to demand the decision be immediately reversed. Parliament soon reversed the nomination.
    (AP, 6/14/13)(Econ, 9/21/13, p.56)
2013        Jun 14, A new bridge linking Vidin in Bulgaria with Calafat in Romania opened. It was just the 2nd on the 500-km stretch of the Danube River that forms the common border between the Balkan neighbors.
    (AP, 6/14/13)

2013        Jul 18, In Bulgaria demonstrators who have conducted for 35 straight days anti-government protests in Sofia, now called for a round-the-clock blockade of the Parliament building.
    (AP, 7/18/13)

2013        Jul 24, Bulgarian police broke through a blockade of protesters and released more than 100 lawmakers, journalists, and staffers stuck inside the parliament building in the capital, Sofia, ending the latest flare-up of anti-government sentiments in the country but doing little to resolve the overall unhappiness of the public with their government.
    (CSM, 7/24/13)

2013        Sep 4, In Bulgaria hundreds of protesters rallied in Sofia in front of parliament, demanding the resignation of the Socialist-led government that they accuse of having murky links to influential business circles.
    (Reuters, 9/4/13)

2013        Nov 1, Bulgaria's ruling alliance asked the country's top court to quash a widely criticized ban on arable land acquisitions by foreigners to avert infringement action by the EU.
    (Reuters, 11/1/13)

2013        Nov 10, In Bulgaria several thousand people protested in Sofia to demand that the nation's Socialist-backed government step down to make way for early elections.
    (AP, 11/10/13)

2013        Nov 12, Bulgaria's premier and president issued a joint appeal against xenophobia following a number of racist incidents as the EU's poorest country struggles with an influx of Syrian refugees. Protesters tried to blockade the parliament, clashing with police as they demanded the country's left-leaning government resign and early elections be called.
    (AFP, 11/12/13)(AP, 11/12/13)

2013        Nov 16, In Bulgaria tens of thousands of supporters of the main political parties gathered in Sofia and Plovdiv at pro- and anti-government rallies, reflecting the division that has paralyzed the nation for months.
    (AP, 11/16/13)

2013        Nov 20, About 4,000 Bulgarian workers rallied against low wages and a lack of jobs, in a possible sign that opposition to the Socialist-led cabinet may be spreading beyond daily protests staged mostly by students.
    (Reuters, 11/20/13)

2014        Jan 1, The European Commission said Romanians and Bulgarians now have the right to work in any of the European Union's 28 countries but "no major increase" in emigration is expected.
    (AFP, 1/1/14)

2014        Jan 18, Police in central Greece said they had arrested seven people including five Bulgarians for attempted baby trafficking.
    (AFP, 1/18/14)

2014        Jan 29, A cold spell and snowstorms was sweeping across parts of central and eastern Europe, disrupting power supplies, travel and schools. Bulgaria reported 4 deaths in recent days due to the weather.
    (AP, 1/29/14)

2014        Mar 7, Macedonian police said they have arrested 13 people, including the head of a customs office at the Macedonia-Bulgaria border crossing, on suspicion of participating in a ring smuggling designer clothing from Greece and Bulgaria.
    (AP, 3/7/14)

2014        Mar 14, A Bulgarian policeman was killed and three officers wounded in a shootout with Petko Petkov (52), who had threatened the pupils and the headmaster of a school in the central town of Lyaskovets.
    (Reuters, 3/14/14)

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