From Novinite

Bulgaria’s Turkish party ‘could support’ lustration process against communist-era spies

Lyutvi Mestan, deputy leader of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms

The Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF), the party led and supported in the main by Bulgarians of ethnic Turkish descent, could support a thorough process of lustration against former communist-era State Security agents, senior MRF figures say.

The development is notable because not only did the MRF serve in coalition with the Bulgarian Socialist Party, the lineal successor to the Bulgarian Communist Party and a vociferous opponent of lustration, but MRF leader Ahmed Dogan is among those previously disclosed to have been a State Security collaborator.

The statements by MRF leaders are among the latest developments in the political drama that erupted after Bulgaria’s Dossier Commission disclosed on December 14 that about 45 per cent of the country’s top diplomats formerly worked for State Security.

Battle lines have been drawn between, on the one side, Prime Minister Boiko Borissov, Foreign Minister Nikolai Mladenov and ruling party GERB, which want former communist secret service collaborators expelled from the foreign service, and on the other side, President Georgi Purvanov and the socialist party, which vehemently oppose a recall of serving diplomats or new legislation to prevent further such appointments.

The MRF position, however, has a refinement of its own – linked to the communist-era "
Regeneration Process"
by which Bulgarians of Turkish ethnicity were forced to adopt Slavonic names in a violent and bizarre episode during which the then-regime claimed that this was a correction of their supposed forced conversion to Islam during the Ottoman era.

The "
Regeneration Process"
led not only to an exodus of ethnic Turks from Bulgaria to Turkey, but in turn was the political prism that brought, and keeps, the MRF in Bulgaria’s political spectrum. The MRF’s share of parliamentary seats generally has been assured by factors including a loyal electorate, and the party frequently has signalled that a share of power for it sends a reassuring signal about ethnic tolerance in Bulgaria.

The position on lustration, however, is effectively the first significant time since Borissov’s party came into power in July 2009, defeating the socialists and the MRF, that the MRF has not stood with their erstwhile socialist partners.

Speaking to mass-circulation Bulgarian-language daily 24 Chassa, MRF MP Kamen Kostadinov said that the party could support lustration measures but only if they applied to all forms of public office, and most of all to those who took part in the "
Regeneration Process"
.

The daily quoted Borissov as saying that he was not surprised that the MRF had decided to support GERB on an issue that was important to Bulgaria.

Kostadinov was quoted as saying that if legislation was approved providing for "
total lustration"
of former State Security agents, MRF leader Ahmed Dogan was prepared to withdraw from politics.

However, speaking to Bulgarian National Television’s morning talk show on December 21, MRF deputy leader Lyutvi Mestan, while confirming the party’s position on possible lustration legislation, said that he was not aware of any such thing being said, "
and I cannot comment on a fiction"
.

Mestan said that the MRF had stated its position in a meeting with Foreign Minister Mladenov, who has been holding consultations with parties represented in Parliament about possible lustration legislation.

Earlier, media reports quoted constitutional lawyers as saying that lustration legislation would not survive a challenge in Bulgaria’s Constitutional Court.

Borissov is currently on a visit abroad, and reportedly will on his return on December 23 send a formal letter to President Purvanov asking the head of state to recall the diplomats found to have been State Security collaborators.

Purvanov, himself confirmed to have collaborated with State Security although he insists that he did so only in his capacity as a historical researcher, repeatedly has rejected such calls and has said that he opposes lustration.

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Hands up everyone who knows what lustration means without looking it up. I thought it had something to do with the neighbour's wife

I don't know anything about your neighbours wife, but it looks as though the Bulgarians ought to be putting a call in for James . . . James Bond that is Special Agent, he will sort it all out easily.

itchyfeet wrote:

I don't know anything about your neighbours wife, but it looks as though the Bulgarians ought to be putting a call in for James . . . James Bond that is Special Agent, he will sort it all out easily.

Yeah, give me a gun (preferably Walther PPK), 30 years off my age and I would sort it soon In fact, my neighbour's wife is a dog and I'll stick with my older girlfriend!! :)))