874.00/8–345: Telegram
The United States Representative in Bulgaria (Barnes) to the Secretary of State
[Received 3:33 p.m.]
410. Reference my telegram 403, July 31.18 The Fatherland Front has now launched general campaign for invalidation of candidatures on opposition list. Some are held ineligible on grounds that they are members of FF parties, such as Nikola Petkov, or failed to resign government positions within allotted time, as Peter Koev, Agrarian Secretary General of Ministry of Finance, or others are charged with being supporters of G. M. Dimitrov, even of Alexander Tsankov,19 or collaborators with pre-FF governments, anti-Semitic or simply Fascists. Three latter charges are utterly ridiculous when examined in light of fact that most candidates in question played leading role [Page 274] in public affairs from Sept 9 until very recently. Intimidation by widespread arrests in the provinces even beatings authentically reported.
Repeated Moscow as 211.
- Ibid., p. 734.↩
- Bulgarian Prime Minister after coup d’état, June 1923; convicted in absentia as war criminal.↩