A Story From Bulgaria

European Bank for Reconstrction and DevelopmentPrincipal Manager Aleksandar Hadzhiivanov
  Without any special profession on human right, I'd just like to tell a real story happening on my family and home country. The lesson from history did inspire me some thoughts about human rights and how the government should act to protect the people's rights.

  I was born in an old and distinguished family in Bulgaria. Located in Balkan area between Europe and Asia, Bulgaria has been a place full of mixed influence from East and West since ever, ranging from ancient Thracians and Macedonians to Ottoman Empire and the following West European countries and Russia. This tradition stimulated Bulgaria to form a diversified, multilateral and colourful culture. Beginning in 1878, Bulgaria was nominally ruled by West European royal houses. After choosing the losing parties in both World Wars, Bulgaria fell into the influence of Soviet sphere after World War II and was administered by a Communist government throughout 1946 to 1990. It is not inconceivable that under "dictatorship of proletarians" all citizens with other than the "right" mind were persecuted and deprived of their properties and citizen rights under the Communism administration. However, the depressed rights for ordinal people didn't get any improvement while all the more or less wealthier peoples were deprived of their properties. A new social class with prerogative emerged from the people who were holding the power in administration. Their tolerance of different opinions was even worse than the previous royal family did. They did not accept any discrepancy at all. Frankly speaking, I did not feel sorry about the loss of properties. However, their hostility to opposite ideas and the treatment they forced on people who they conceived as a threat did impress me a lot. One of the examples was my uncle.

  My uncle, Mr. Krastyo Hadzhiivanov, was a bright young chap writing poetry, sporting, promoting Esperanto as a language facilitating communication and understanding among peoples of different nationalities and cultural backgrounds. He was dreaming about mankind brotherhood and friendship for a world without borders during the time of war and oppression. He joined the resistance against Nazi in the War time, which unfortunately was the side Bulgaria allied with in the World War II, meanwhile he continued reciting poets to people in the villages even under the dangerous spy-like activities. After the war, the newly established Communist government admired his talent and offered him to study literature in Moscow. He however refused saying that "Moscow is too close to Siberia" referring about Stalinist concentration camps there. Since that he was perceived as a threat by the authority. After being prosecuted for his democratic and humanistic beliefs, he was sent to a mine where he was mistreated and beaten. He managed to escape from the mines successfully and tried to flee to Greece. Unfortunately, he didn't make it and his life ended at an ambush at the border, at age 22.

  It's very sad how my uncle's life went to an end, on top of the shocking fact how he was treated. Now we have freedom to speak and express our ideas and the rights are so precious and worthy of protection and fighting for. "The Universal Declaration of Human Rights" stipulated that "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood"1. My uncle died for his beliefs of love, friendship, justice, peace and freedom because the government did not have "a spirit of brotherhood" but just ordered people to obey their rules. I am convinced that a reciprocal respect is essential to human rights. When people can understand the difference and accept it, our rights can be protected via the respects form each other. It's miserable that my uncle did not even get any one of the rights which he fought for all his life. The Communist's intolerance of different ideas led to a tragic consequence, not only the fading away of a great poet but also the lack of fundamental respect to people and their rights. Respect, I believe, is one of the elements to promote a fair and harmony society. We are more willing to understand and accept the diversity once we respect the others; reciprocally we will get empathy in return. Furthermore, we will be willing to deal with the disagreement through discussion and negotiation instead of enforcement. The society will become more peaceful.

  Surprisingly, the change of political system to Democracy did not translate much improvement in society. After the collapse of Berlin Wall, the wave of democracy became so strong that no one can resist, which is evidenced by the revolution of several countries, like Czech, Poland, Ukraine and so on. Politicians, feeling the unavoidable trend of transferring to democracy, decided to join the campaign and changed the system. Nevertheless, the change of system does not mean the change of minds or behaviours of policy-makers. Though they are not going to force people to follow the rules strictly, they still tried to take as much advantage from the government projects. They do not put much focus on how to improve the living standards and public welfare, how to educate people to know their rights and how to protect their own rights. The society became more corrupted, less efficient and less productive.

  Take privatization for instance, the procedures was not fairly open but concentrated on few related people. The proceeds flowed into the pockets of few people instead of benefiting general public. It's very sad that people did not have a good role model and did not get the necessary education to learn their rights.

  It is meaningless when the words in law for human rights are not put into practice. Without implementation and actions, human rights can not be guarded by itself. The human right is beyond vote or election and lying more on how to have a fair justice system, how to improve public welfare and how to secure equal opportunity for everybody.

  It is very important that the police-makers have intention and determination to obey the law and treat everyone equally in accordance the rules, otherwise the laws and rules would be more like the articles on paper without real effects. The self interest only leads to distortion of orders and justice. Only the laws are implemented in a balanced and unbiased way, the human rights and social welfare can be in a right direction. A democratic system is simply not enough to guarantee a fair and justice society unless the government is willing to protect its people.