site.btaAmbassador Bachvarova: "Bulgarian Jews' Salvation Teaches Meaningful Lessons"

"We have an exceedingly great responsibility to revisit this event because it teaches so many meaningful lessons for the present," Bulgaria's Ambassador in Tel Aviv Rumyana Bachvarova said here on Wednesday, referring to the salvation of Bulgarian Jews from the Holocaust, whose 80th anniversary is forthcoming.

The diplomat addressed the 17th World Meeting of Bulgarian Media, which is taking place in Israel from November 1 to 3.

"Marking this anniversary is important because the salvation of Bulgarian Jews is not only a fact of history but is also a part of everyday life, considering that people who experienced it are still living here in Israel," she added.

The lessons of the salvation of Bulgarian Jews demonstrate the courage, spirit and values of the Bulgarian people, the diplomat said. "This was not a single act but a series of events in Bulgarian public and political life that prompted King Boris III to halt the deportation [of Bulgaria's Jews to Nazi death camps]," she pointed out.

Bachvarova pointed out that 48,000 Jews were saved but, deplorably, 11,434 Jews from Macedonia and Thrace, which were then administrated by Bulgaria, perished in the Nazi death camps. "This is a fact that we cannot deny and a grief that we carry," she commented, adding that every year on March 9 the Embassy pays floral tribute to the memorial plaques for the Holocaust victims from Macedonia and Thrace.
 
The Ambassador acknowledged the Bulgarian Jews' gratitude to the Bulgarian State and the Bulgarian nation. "We Bulgarians owe gratitude to the Bulgarian Jews who have settled here for projecting an exceedingly positive image of our country. If you are a Bulgarian, you are regarded as an undoubtedly good person," she added. 

Bachvarova described the media as "probably the best partner of the history that we are bound to preserve."