NEGOTIATION SUCCEEDS

Waikato Times, Volume 127, Issue 21198, 22 August 1940, Page 7

NEGOTIATION SUCCEEDS

RUMANIA CEDES DOBRUDJA BULGARIA’S CLAIMS PEACEABLY SETTLED BOUNDARIES OF 1912 REVERTED TO (Received Aug. 22, 1.15 p.m.) (United Press Assn.—Elec. Tel. Copyright) BUCHAREST, August 21 Bulgaria and Rumania have reached an agreement regarding Dobrudja, fixing the new frontiers on the 1912 line. The territory ceded to Bulgaria comprises the provinces of Durostar, Galiacra and Balcic. The new Bulgarian-Rumanian frontier in South Dobruja runs from a point just northward of Silistra to the Black Sea just southward of Mangalia. Bulgarian troops are already near the frontier ready to inarch in to the new territory when the final agreement is signed. Plans have been completed for the occupation of the Durostar and Galiacra provinces in three hours, also the immediate establishment of a Bulgarian administration to avoid incidents. Negotiations on technical questions, including the exchange of populations and compensation are continuing at Craiova. Bulgaria will send to Rumania all Rumanians in the ceded territory, also those in Bulgaria, who are estimated at 50,000. Bulgaria has rejected Rumania’s demand for the repatriation of Bulgarians living in the Rumanian province of Banat, and in Bucharest.

Dobrudja, the south-eastern province of Rumania, was taken partly from Bulgaria during the second Balkan War in 1913 and continuously claimed back by Bulgaria since. Under the peace treaty of Bucharest in 1918 the province returned temporarily to Bulgaria, but it was given back to Rumania by the treaty of Neuilly in 1919. A fertile and strategically important region, Dobrudja is racially a very variegated pattern. Rumanian statistics claim a Rumanian majority, Bulgarian figures a Bulgarian one. There seem to be about 350,000 Bulgarians, 350,000 Rumanians, about 300,000 Turks (who are to be gradually repatriated to Turkey), and various other racial groups.