1. PURGES IN COMMUNIST PARTY IN 1950 2. ORGANIZATION OF COMMUNIST PARTY 3. COMMUNIST AUXILIARY ORGANIZATIONS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP82-00457R009700350002-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 14, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 14, 2000
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: December 20, 1951
• Content Type: REPORT

,e1tiL~tr->t- %4pproved For Release 2001/03/06 CIA-RDP82-00457R009700350002-
CLASSIFICATION COs'r'IDi r'TIc.L/CO -TROL of 3'I CI.t?,S 0 ,-Ty
CENTRAL INELILIGENCERAGE CY REPORT NO.
INFORMATION REPORT CD NO.
COUNTRY Bulgaria
SUBJECT 1. Purges in Communist Party in 1950
2. Organizationcrr Communist Party
3. Co ist Auxiliary Organizations
PLACE 25X1Mft , ,:.. > .
ACQUIRED
DATE OF 25X1 A
INFO.
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36-3
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DATE DISTR. 20 Dec, 1951
NO. OF PAGES 2
. OF ENCLS.
SUPPLEMENT TO
REPORT NO.
1. The Bulgarian Communist Party, as a member of the Corlinforrr.,, is subordinate
to the Soviet Cornauntst Party and is under the direct supervision of the latter.
The Communist .Party Is organized and ruled e.ecordine to the principle of "demo-
cratic eentralisr:,".but in reality, an absolute dictatorship is exercised, and
there is no opportunity to control the activity of the ruling; bodies,
2. In the first few years after 9 Septei;iber 1944, the Communist Party had 400,000
members, but since the purges its members total only 300,000. Of these, only
20,000 are old Party members. Great numbers of new members have joined the
Party for opportunistic reasons.. As a party of the working class, the Com-
munist Party should be composed mostly of workers, but actually only about
20 per cent of its mea'bers are workers. The increase in membership during
1950 was very small in spite of a ci.r.:paign to recruit new members.,
3. The Bulgarian Cornrunist Party is eonst.untly conducting purges In the purge
of 1950, Nicolas Popov, the Secretary of the Party Organization of Radio Sofia,
was excluded from the Party"because of his bourgeois origin," and today he
cannot find a job. A fori:er partisan, Zdravka Kolova, radio Sofia euployee,
was arrested near the end of 1950 for "Traycho Koetovism." In November 1950
Dimitur Dimov, one of the Secretaries of the Central Cor..r..ittee of the Bulgarian
Communist Party, was arrested. About January 1951, General Blagoi Penev, the
Director of the People's Militia, was arrested. Anton Kirilov, the chief of
the Investigation Section of State Security, and Nikola Mihailov Zagorski
and Bachi Zeev, ex-chiefs of sections of State Security, were also arrested
in 1950.
4. To becor;a a, member of the Bulgarian Cornriunist Party, a candidate rust submit
a request to the Secretary of the Party Organization at the institution where
he works. The request r;tust be signed by two guarantors, bothcf whom rust be
Party members. After the oandidate's past has been carefully scrutinized, he
is accepted or rejected by open voting at a general r. .eeting of the Party
organization. He remains an alternate rmembo r of the Communist Party for one
year. During this period he receives theoretical instruction and is carefully
watched. After the year of testing is over, he is accepted as a regular member
of the Communist Party or he is rejected.
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5. The Bulgarian Communist Party is beaded by a Central Committee consisting of
about 30 members and alternates. The Central Committee has several secretaries
and a Secretary-General. Attached to the Central Committee is a bureaucratic
machine of about one thousand persons. This apparatus is a miniature of the
entire governmental regime; there is a military affairs sector, foreign affairs
sector, economic sector, et cetera. The offices of the apparatus are in Sofia
on the premises of the former regency at the corner of Parizh and Moskovska
Streets, opposite the church of St. Sophia.
6. The Politburo is cor1gosed of five or six members of the Central Committee,
and it is the actual ruling body of the country.
7. The Party has district, country, and town organizations, and it. also has
organizations in factories, collectives. and other institutions. In Sofia
there were also sector organizations. At the head of each Party organization,
there is a Party Secretary with a "buro" and ai iliary personnel. By means
of these so-called "string" organizations the Bulgarian Comraanist Party carries
out its decisions. However, these organizi:~tions have been found to be insuffi-
,cient, and the Bulgarian Communist Party has organized auxiliary organizations.
8. The foremost of the ate iliary organizations Is the Fatherland Front Organiza-
tion which has about 1,200,000 members. Its structure is similar to that of
the Bulgarian Communist Party, and members are accepted easily. This organiza-
tion carries out decisions of the Government in the localities, and indoctri-
nates the masses in Marxist teachings by means of conferences, treetings,
and courses. The Fatherland Front also watches over the behavior of the citi-
zens and disseminates propaganda for the Bulgarian Communist Party. At the
and of 1950 a campaign was began to recruit new members for the organization.
Minimum qualifications were required to join.
9, The General Workers Professional Union is another auxiliary organization
through which Party and non--Party members are directed by the regime. Theoreti-
cally this organization is supposed to protect the interests of the workers,
but actually it acts to suppress them. Those who are not members of the union
have great difficulty finding a job.
10. Another auxiliar oxrganization, the Union of Fighters Against Fascism, includes
participants in the resistance against all the governments since 1920, and those
who took part in the war against the Gori,ans. This a the closest organization
to the Bulgarian. Communist Party, and its purpose is to keep reserve cadres
at the disposal of the Bulgarian Communist Party in case of war or civil dis-
turbance.1
11. The Bulgarian Red Cross and the Bulgarian?Soviet Associations are other
auxiliary organizations which are entirely subordinate to the Bulgarian
Com:uaniet Party.
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1. Comment: Several reports have mentioned the
recent merger of the Union of Fighters Against Fascism with the People's
Union for Sport and Technics to form the Voluntary Organization for
Defense Cooperation, (DOSO: Dobrovolnata Organazataia Sudeystvie na
Otbr, ana) .
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