Nikola Petkov

Bust of Nikola Petkov in Sofia

Nikola Dimitrov Petkow (also written Nikola Dimitrov Petkov , Bulgarian Никола Димитров Петков ; * July 8, 1893 in Sofia ; † September 23, 1947 , ibid) was a Bulgarian politician of the Bulgarian Agrarian People's Union (BZNS). The politician Petko Petkow was his brother. Like many other peasant leaders in Soviet-controlled areas of Eastern Europe from 1945 to 1947, Petkov was arrested and executed after the end of World War II.

Life

Nikola Petkow was born in 1893 into the family of the liberal politician and Stambolovist of the People's Liberal Party , Dimitar Petkow , after his family had previously left the North Dobruja . In 1907 his father, who was meanwhile prime minister of the country, was murdered in an assassination attempt on the economics and agriculture minister Nikola Genadiev .

Nikola graduated from the First Boys' High School in Sofia in 1910 and then enrolled in the Sorbonne in Paris to study political science and law . When the First Balkan War broke out in 1912, he interrupted his studies to go to war. The Second Balkan War and the First World War soon followed the first . It was only after the end of the First World War that he returned to Paris and was able to continue his studies. He graduated from the Sorbonne in 1922 as one of the best of the year. He then worked in the Bulgarian delegation in Paris until the putsch of June 9, 1923 , when the peasant government of Aleksandar Stambolijski in Sofia was overthrown by right-wing politicians, including Aleksandar Zankow . However, he stayed in Paris and worked as a journalist. His brother Petko Petkow was shot dead by a hit man in 1924.

Back in Bulgaria

Nikola Petkow returned to Bulgaria in 1929 and was initially editor of the newspapers Semja (Bulgarian Земя , German Boden, Land) and Semedelsko Sname (Bulgarian Земеделско знаме , German Agricultural Flag), the organs of the Bulgarian Agrarian People's Union (Aleksandar Stambolijski for short BZNS-AS), which represented a split of the left wing of the BZNS. During this time he wrote and published a book about the life of Aleksandar Stambolijski and the role of peasants in politics. During this time he was also elected to the board of BZNS-AS.

On May 19, 1934 members of the military league and the group " Sweno " banned all parties, unions and youth organizations, their leaders were persecuted and interned. Nikola Petkow founded the radical wing of the BZNS Pladne together with Georgi M. Dimitrov .

When King Boris established sole rule in 1935, Nikola Petkow supported other democratic parties, including the Bulgarian Workers' Party (later the Bulgarian Communist Party ), in calling for the constitution to be reinstated . When the constitution gradually came into force in 1937 and parliamentary elections were initiated in 1938, Nikola Petkow could be elected as a member of the Narodno Sabranie . Petkow continued to campaign for the full implementation of the Tarnow Constitution , for which he was arrested in 1939 and interned at Ivaylovgrad .

When Georgi M. Dimitrov emigrated to the Soviet Union in 1941, Nikola Petkow took over the chairmanship of the BZNS-AS. In the same year he was transferred to the labor camp for political prisoners Gonda Woda near Asenovgrad . Once there, he organized the formation of a Fatherland Front with the interned leaders of the other political parties and became a representative of the BZNS in their National Council. At the end of 1943 he was transferred to the Swishtow prison, where he continued his organizational work. He was released in the summer of 1944 and returned to Sofia.

On September 5, 1944, the Soviet Union declared war on Bulgaria, which had fought alongside Germany in World War II, and occupied the country. The Fatherland Front (OF), which was co-organized by Petkow but was now determined by the communists , took over power in the country during the course of the Soviet occupation. Between September 9, 1944 and August 26, 1945 he was minister without portfolio in the first government of the OF, according to other information, deputy prime minister (deputy prime minister). In January 1946, Nikola Petkow was next to Kosta Lultschew one of the leaders of the United Opposition, an anti-communist association in the Bulgarian parliament. Since November 26, 1946 he was a member of the 6th Great People's Assembly.

His struggle to preserve parliamentary democracy was viewed by the communists as a counterrevolutionary activity. The fact that the United States and Great Britain had ultimately called for Petkov's re-entry into government at the Paris Peace Conference in 1946 did anything but improve his position. Therefore, on June 5, 1947, his parliamentary immunity was lifted and Petkow was arrested in parliament. After a show trial with no actual defense - he protested his innocence - he was sentenced to death on August 16 for espionage . He was under the protests of the Western States on 23 September 1947 to train executed. He was denied a Christian burial; his body was buried in an unknown grave.

On January 15, 1990, Nikola Petkov was posthumously rehabilitated.

Others

The show trial of Nikola Petkov inspired the British author Eric Ambler to write his political thriller The Deltschev case (1951).

literature

• Yvan Vanden Berghe, Martine Westerman: The Cold War: 1917-1991 , Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2002, p. 104
• Stefan Appelius : Bulgaria: Europe's Far East. Bouvier, 2006, pp. 95-96, p. 305

Web links

• Nikola Petkow in Encyclopedia Britannica
• Newspaper article about Nikola Petkow in the 20th century press kit of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .

Individual evidence

1. ^ German Society for Eastern European Studies: East Europe , Volume 5, Page 263. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Munich 1955
2. ^ Propylaea: The clever alphabet , third volume, page 97. Ullstein Verlag, Berlin 1957
3. ↑ Ulrich Büchsenschütz: Minority Policy in Bulgaria , 1997, p. 17. (PDF; 1.8 MB)