Word: bulgarias
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...that "all interested European parties" be included-a demand that seemed calculated to ensure that MBFR would be a collection of dead letters. Last week speaking for its NATO partners, the U.S. agreed to Vienna, but insisted that only a modest expansion of the talks would be acceptable. Bulgaria and Rumania would be allowed to join in as rotating Warsaw Pact "observers," just as Norway, Denmark, Italy, Greece and Turkey will on the NATO side...
Massive infusions of Russian capital, raw materials and technology are pushing Bulgaria into the industrial age. A major reason for Bulgaria's windfall lies in its geographic position. The only trustworthy Soviet satellite in the Balkan Peninsula, Bulgaria is bordered by relatively independent Rumania, maverick Yugoslavia, and two NATO member states, Greece and Turkey. Expanding Soviet interest in the nearby Middle East and Mediterranean has given this 43,000-sq. mi. enclave new strategic importance. Although the Kremlin is so confident of Bulgarian loyalty that no Russian troops are stationed there, the Soviets have deployed "Frog" and "Skud" ground...
Even without armed divisions, the Soviet presence in Bulgaria is exceptionally high-powered. The Kremlin's emissary to Sofia, Vladimir Bazovsky, acts more like an imperial proconsul than an ambassador. Bazovsky's staff includes high-ranking "advisers" to the Bulgarian armed forces and secret police. Such supervision seems scarcely necessary, however; Bulgaria's Moscow-trained leadership has maintained a tighter grip on its people than any other Soviet-bloc government. Party Leader Todor Zhivkov, 61, who has been in power for 18 years, presides over the oldest Politburo in Eastern Europe (average age of full members...
...Russian people, with whom they have ethnic, linguistic and religious affinities. To such pragmatic young Bulgarian bureaucrats as Petar Mladenov, 36, the youngest Foreign Minister in Europe, and Andrei Lukanov, 34, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Trade, this friendliness extends even to the Soviet government. According to Lukanov, Bulgaria's transformation from an agricultural backwater into an industrial and trading power in the Balkans is largely owing to Soviet aid. "Without the U.S.S.R.," he said, "it would have been impossible for us to develop our exports to the point where we are now the world's largest exporter...
Comfort. In spite of enduring contradictions, there is an overwhelming impression in Bulgaria of modest but widespread comfort, prosperity in the villages around the capital and impressive organization in agriculture. Sofia is striking for its many sumptuously planted parks, its wide-domed churches brightly lit at night and the yellow cobblestones that pave the main boulevards. City residents, proud of their distinctive cobblestones, have successfully persuaded the municipal authorities to abandon plans to replace them with asphalt. One woman journalist explained, "We couldn't let them tear up our streets," adding, "after all, they're paved in gold...