LAW IN BULGARIA

Southland Times, Issue 21362, 7 April 1931, Page 8

LAW IN BULGARIA

SEVERITY WITH CLEMENCY. TRIAL OF REVOLUTIONARIES. A verdict which was pronounced by the court in Sofia, Bulgaria, during December in the case of the state against Ivan Mihailoff, the noted revolutionaiy leader, and' three other Macedonians, indicates that neither the army, the police, nor the courts intend to attempt to abolish' the Macedonian Revolutionary Organization. It is true that the sentence was a 50-50 affair, since two of the accused were condemned and two, including the chief himself, were acquitted. It has become almost traditional for courts on this continent to acquit persons indicted for political murders committed in the name and at the commands of revolutionary organizations. However, the Bulgarian court did not do that. It showed no mercy to the actual criminals. Neither their patriotism nor the fact that they acted on the instructions of their chief for the sake of their “oppressed brothers” in Serbian Macedonia moved the court. In this part of the case the judges acted with commendable independence and impartiality. Although not formally, the Macedonian Revolutionary Organization was recognized. That body publicly and officially accepted full responsibility for the act which caused the trial and declared that in a similar manner it would dispose of all “enemies of the Macedonian cause.”

There was no room for the slightest doubt that the executive body of a conspiratory organization in Bulgaria arranged for two of its members to assinate one of its opponents in Sofia in broad daylight, •and that the organization considers it has a right to treat all its enemies in the same way. It is equally plain that Mihailoff is the head of the revolutionary body and responsible for its acts and decisions. Nor does anyone doubt that Mihailoff is in Bulgaria. In fact his declarations and views are regularly published in one of the daily papers there. Yet he was not brought into court but tried in his absence and acquitted on the grounds that he personally had not given the orders for the crime. Two hundred and seven Bulgarian lawyers offered to defend the Revolutionist Mihailoff. He and his revoultionary comrades were pictured at the trial as champions of liberty and justice. His indictment was decried as a national scandal. Before the trial in an official declaration the organization publicly hurled defiance in the face of the Bulgarian state. Serbia shows no intention of granting more liberty to its Bulgaro-Macedonian minority, and the Macedonian revolutionists are determined to continue their hostilities. This shows how far the Balkans are from a sincere understanding.