Bulgaria: How a military failure brought independence: Bulgaria celebrates 139th anniversary of April Uprising

May 3, 2015 By administrator

Bulgaria celebrates 139th anniversary, 30,000 massacred by Turks

Today Bulgaria is celebrating the 139th anniversary of the April Uprising, one of the main drivers for independence organised by the Bulgarians in the Ottoman Empire from April to May 1876, which indirectly resulted in the re-establishment of Bulgaria in 1878. Only some 10,000 men from 95 villages participated in the uprising in the dawn of fire waepons-a novelty at the time.

The Ottoman response was immediate and severe. They mobilized detachments of regular troops and also irregular bashi-bazouks. These forces attacked the first insurgent towns as early as 25 April. The Turkish forces massacred of civilian populations, the principal places being Panagurishte, Perushtitza, Bratzigovo, and Batak.

By the middle of May, the insurrection was completely suppressed; one of the last sparks of resistance was poet Hristo Botev’s attempt to come to the rebels’ rescue with a detachment of Bulgarian political émigrés resident in Romania, ending with the unit’s rout and Botev’s death. It is generally accepted that the death toll on the Bulgarian part was around 30,000.

The ruthless surpression of the revolution led to international acknowledgement of the self-determination of the Bulgarians and their right to have their own nation state. Thus while a military defeat, the April uprising is still the largest political success in the Bulgarian history.

source: standartnews.com

US Congressman Schiff disappointed by Obama’s failure to recognize Genocide

April 22, 2015 By administrator

Rep Adam Schiff (D-CA), the lead sponsor of the Armenian Genocide Truth and Justice Resolution in US Congress, has released a statement expressing his disappointment with President Barack Obama’s failure to recognize the Armenian Genocide.

“I’m deeply disappointed that the President, once again, will fail to properly describe the extermination of 1.5 million Armenians from 1915 to 1923 for what it was – genocide. How long must the victim’s and their families wait before our nation has the courage to confront Turkey with the truth about the murderous past of the Ottoman Empire? If not this President, who spoke so eloquently and passionately about recognition in the past, whom? If not after one hundred years, when?

“The United States has long prided itself for being a beacon of human rights, for speaking out against atrocity, for confronting painful chapters of its own past and that of others. This cannot be squared with a policy of complicity in genocide denial by the President or Congress. Last week, the Pope spoke powerfully of the need to bind the wound that continues to bleed in the absence of recognition – I only wish Washington had been listening.”

Lavrov: Iraq show total failure of American-British ‘adventure’

June 12, 2014 By administrator

The events in Iraq are a result of the actions carried out by the US and the UK, and the situation has spiraled out of control, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told journalists.

“It has been reported that the UK foreign minister declared that the events in Iraq are, according to him, an illustration that terrorism is rampant in the region due to the absence of reconciliation in Syria,” Lavrov said.

“We’ve known that our English colleagues have a unique ability to twist everything. But I didn’t expect such cynicism, because the events that are taking place in Iraq are an illustration of a complete failure of the venture started by the US and the UK that allowed it to spiral out of control completely.”

“We express our solidarity with the Iraqi authorities, the Iraqi people who should restore peace and security in their country, but the actions of our Western partners raise a lot of questions,” Lavrov marked.

Lavrov noted that 11 years ago the US president announced the victory of democracy in Iraq, and that“the situation has deteriorated in geometrical progression.”

“The unity of Iraq has been called into question. The rampant terrorism is taking place due to the fact that the occupation troops didn’t pay any attention to the interior political processes, didn’t help the national dialogue, and only pursued their own interests,” Lavrov said.

On Monday night, the terrorists seized control of the town Mosul – the administrative center of the northern province of Nineveh. On Wednesday, the authorities informed the population about the fall of Tikrit, the hometown of former leader Saddam Hussein and just 150km from Baghdad.

Sergey Lavrov has also touched on the developments in Ukraine. He said Moscow demands an immediate investigation into the reports of the use of banned weapons in Ukraine.

We emphasize concern over the reports about the use by the Ukrainian military of fire bombs and other indiscriminate weapons. Those reports must be urgently checked,” Lavrov stressed.

He said the Russian Ambassador to the UN Vitaly Churkin “will be calling the OSCE mission which has observers in Ukraine, to establish facts [of using indiscriminate weapons], as well as will strive for the investigation into the tragedies in Odessa on May 2, in Mariupol on May 9, the ongoing actions in Kramatorsk and Slavyansk, and the snipers’ case on Maidan in February – all those probes should be brought to a close.”

“We know that the European Council is ready to be involved in the probe which the Ukrainian authorities carry out. We are convinced that this should be done,” Lavrov stressed.

Russia is also submitting to the UN the draft resolution on Ukraine calling to follow the roadmap the OSCE previously proposed.

“We’ve asked our UN envoy to submit to the UN Security Council the project on the resolution on the Ukrainian situation because the lack of progress on the halt of the violence and military actions since the start of the punitive operation causes concern,” Lavrov said.

At the moment there is no talk about bringing peacemakers to Ukraine, Lavrov said.

“We don’t think that the situation has reached that point yet. There is still hope for a declaration by [Ukrainian President Petro] Poroshenko that the violence will be stopped and the negotiations will begin,”he added.