Big Excursion

In 1984, the authoritarian communist regime in Sofia embarked on an assimilationist campaign known officially as the "Revival Process" (Bulgarian: Възродителен процес, romanized: Vazroditelen protses). Bulgarian Muslims were made to formally change their names to sufficiently "Bulgarian" ones (primarily those of Slavic and Christian origin).[9] This action provoked backlash from the Muslim population and sparked protests, a rarity in the thirty years in which Todor Zhivkov had led the country as General Secretary of the ruling Communist Party. Tensions continued to simmer, even after the renaming process had been completed, and many Muslims were arrested and even deported from Bulgaria during the 1980s prior to 1989. As the 1980s wore on, however, the Eastern Bloc and Soviet support both waned, undermining the communist regime in Bulgaria.

Often in current Bulgarian discourse, the "Big Excursion" is merged with the longstanding assimilationist policies of the Bulgarian state towards its Muslim minority or the "Revival Process" in particular.[11] It is sometimes treated as merely the endpoint of the latter.[11] In contrast to assimilation campaigns, however, the "Big Excursion" was unprecedented before 1989.[11] Similarly, the Holocaust was of a distinct and unprecedented character from the series of pogroms and anti-semitic campaigns which preceded it and is treated as such by historians.[12]

Following on from the simmering tensions between the regime and Muslim population, the state increasingly cracked down. Many Muslim political leaders were deported in the beginning of 1989, primarily to Austria and Sweden, and the state threatened individual Muslims. One Bulgarian Turk, Rasim Ozgur, recalled that in early May 1989, communist state militiamen told him that they would kill him if he was seen conversing with "'reported people,'" and they also told him that he "was about to emigrate." He thus prepared to leave Bulgaria, doing so once the border with Turkey was opened later that month.[8]

On May 29, 1989, General Secretary Todor Zhivkov announced the opening of the border with Turkey, ostensibly "to allow tourists to visit the neighboring country."[8] Large numbers of Muslims, many of whom, like Rasim Ozgur, had already prepared to leave the country in the face of state intimidation, surged to the Turkish border. Turkey in-turn fully opened the Kapıkule border crossing near the Bulgarian town of Kapitan Andreevo on June 3.[13]

By late August, over 300,000 Muslims had crossed the Bulgarian-Turkish border, leading to a refugee crisis in Turkey. On August 22, Turkey officially closed its border with Bulgaria to stop the flow of "Bulgarian citizens without a Turkish visa".[14] As a result, the number of Muslims crossing into Turkey dropped dramatically, though some did obtain Turkish visas and subsequently cross the border. Indeed, some Bulgarian Muslims who had already packed to leave the country were unable to do so because of the closure,[9] suggesting that the total number of those expelled from Bulgaria would have been higher if not for Turkey's action. Subsequently, Bulgaria did not attempt to more directly expel the Muslim population, though repression would continue until on December 29, 1989, exactly seven months since Zhivkov announced the opening of the Turkish border and just over one month after Zhivkov's resignation, when the government of Petar Mladenov announced that the rights of Muslims would be restored, though it would take two years for that promise to be fully fulfilled.[15]

Even before the ultimate end of the Excursion, large numbers of expellees returned to Bulgaria,[14] with the number accelerating thereafter. By the end of 1990, communist rule had come to an end, with the People's Republic of Bulgaria transformed into simply the Bulgarian Republic, and around 150,000 Muslims had returned. By the end of 1991, as many as 200,000 had returned.[15]

As Bulgaria was a member of the Warsaw Pact and Turkey was a member of NATO, armed conflict involving the two over the "Big Excursion" had the potential to draw in the United States and Soviet Union, the two principal nuclear-armed superpowers of the era. That no armed conflict emerged might suggest that negotiations occurred between the superpowers prior to the Excursion. However, because records in both Russia and the United States remain sealed and the topic has received little scholarly attention, this allegation cannot be confirmed.[16]

The excursion was covered by Western media organizations in 1989, but was front-page news only in Turkey and Yugoslavia. Amidst the tumult in Eastern Europe of that year, western press focused on other developments.[17]

In 2012, the Bulgarian government officially recognized the "Big Excursion" as ethnic cleansing, and called for the prosecution of those responsible.[5] However, that recognition was largely ignored by scholars,[16] and to date Bulgaria does not officially commemorates the ethnic cleansing and the state has not brought criminal charges against any individual involved in carrying out the "Big Excursion". Indeed, Bulgaria has even frequently commemorated the now-deceased Todor Zhivkov on the anniversary of his birth, with former prime minister Boyko Borisov even referring to Zhivkov as the "Great Daddy of the Bulgarian Nation."[20]

Less than a week after the 2012 recognition of the event as ethnic cleansing by the Bulgarian Parliament, the far-right[21][22][23] ultranationalist[22] political party, Ataka, introduced a new bill officially contesting the declaration.[24] According to the bill's authors the declaration and recognition of the 1989 ethnic cleansing would represent a "boost" for "'separatists'", presumably in reference to the nation's Turks and Muslims.[24] This reasoning is in-line with that of Bulgarian nationalists more generally, who often cast the Turkish and Muslim minority in the "role of perennial anti-Bulgarian separatists."[24]

Even in Turkey, few accounts of excursion have been published. What books have been produced primarily regard the individual accounts of expellees, which have typically been printed in limited runs.[25]