The issue with reparations for the Thracian Bulgarians will be put in the context of Turkey's EU membership, Bulgarian PM Sergei Stanishev said in the Parliament, answering a question by nationalist opposition party Ataka, on Friday.After ten years of ceased talks on the issue between the two countries, it was brought up once again during Turkish PM Recep Erdogan's visit to Sofia. There are no time limits on coming up with a decision that have been negotiated, Stanishev said.

According to him the framework has already been agreed on - property issues are to be investigated first, then social ones, and then humanitarian ones. A major problem may be the lack of documentation of property of Minor Asia (Anatolia) or Thrace Bulgarians.

The history of the issue dates from 1913 and the Second Balkan War, when the military actions between Serbia, Greece, Montenegro and Romania against Bulgaria were in full progress, the Ottoman Empire took advantage of the situation to recover some of its former possessions in Thrace including Adrianople.

As a result of this violent process approximately 200,000 Bulgarians were killed or forced to leave their homes and properties forever, seeking salvation in territories, controlled by Bulgarian army and paramilitary formation IMORO.

The entire community of the Thracian Bulgarians in these regions, where they were relative ethnic majority before the Balkan wars, was wiped out. Their inheritors in contemporary Bulgaria are about 800,000 people.

First published:

The legal property rights of the expelled Thracian Bulgarians were recognized fully by the Republic of Turkey through the Treaty of Angora (Ankara), signed on October 18, 1925, which have been never denounced or enforced too. Today, almost one century after 1913, the heirs of the Bulgarian refugees aren't compensated yet. /bnn/