site.bta Bessarabian Bulgarians Urge Opening of Bulgarian Consulate in Bolhrad

Bessarabian Bulgarians call for opening of Bulgarian consulate in Bolhrad. The leadership of the Rodolyubets [Patriot] cultural society for relations with Bessarabian and Taurian Bulgarians wrote to Foreign Minister Teodora Genchovska urging opening of a Bulgarian consulate in the town of Bolhrad, Odessa region (Ukraine), Maria Popova, editor-in-chief of the Obozrenie Plyus daily, told BTA on Wednesday.

The letter to Genchovska says that the current situation in Ukraine makes it urgent to open a Bulgarian consulate in Bolhrad. “It is known that many of our compatriots have temporarily settled near the Moldavian and Romanian borders. In addition to serving the needs of many Bulgarians in the region, a Bulgarian consulate could perform logistical functions and coordinate humanitarian, cultural and educational projects,” the letter says.

The request to open a Bulgarian consulate in Bolhrad, which is the unofficial centre of the Bessarabian Bulgarian community, has been made more than once by Bulgarians in the Bolhrad region, and an official letter to the same effect has been sent to the Foreign Ministry by the Bolhrad City Council.

Some 150,000 Bulgarians resettled from Southeastern Bulgaria to Wallachia, Bessarabia (which now is divided between present-day Moldova and Southwest Ukraine), Russia and Southern Ukraine between 1774 and 1852 in the wake of several Russo-Turkish wars.

Since its founding in the 1820s, Bolhrad has been a cultural centre of the Bulgarian community in Bessarabia.