Bulgarian Communist Party
Българска Комунистическа Партия Bâlgarska Komunisticheska Partiya |
|
---|---|
First leader | Dimitar Blagoev |
Last leader | Alexander Lilov |
Founded | 1903 |
Dissolved | 3 April 1990 |
Split from | Bulgarian Workers' Social Democratic Party |
Succeeded by | Bulgarian Socialist Party |
Headquarters | Sofia |
Newspaper | Rabotnichesko Delo |
Youth wing | Workers Youth League |
Armed wing | Military organisation of BCP |
Ideology |
Communism Marxism–Leninism |
European affiliation | Balkan Communist Federation (1921–1939) |
International affiliation | Comintern (1919–1943), Cominform (1948–1956) |
Colours | Red, White |
Anthem | The Internationale |
The Bulgarian Communist Party (BCP) (Българска Комунистическа Партия, Bâlgarska Komunisticheska Partiya; БКП, BKP) was the Communist and Marxist-Leninist ruling party of the People's Republic of Bulgaria from 1946 until 1989 when the country ceased to be a communist state. The Bulgarian Communist Party had dominated the Fatherland Front coalition that took power in 1944, late in World War II, after it led a coup against Bulgaria's tsarist regime in conjunction with the Red Army's crossing the border.
The party's origins lay in the Bulgarian Social Democratic Workers' Party (Tesnyatsi) (Tesni Socialisti, "Narrow Socialists"), which was founded in 1903 after a split in the 10th Congress of the Bulgarian Social Democratic Workers' Party.
The party's founding leader was Dimitar Blagoev, who was the driving force behind the formation of the BSDWP in 1894. It comprised most of the hardline Marxists in the Social Democratic Workers' Party. The party opposed World War I and was sympathetic to the October Revolution in Russia. Under Blagoev's leadership, the party applied to join the Communist International upon its founding in 1919. Upon joining the Comintern the party was reorganised as the Communist Party of Bulgaria.
Georgi Dimitrov was a member of the party's Central Committee from its inception in 1919 until his death in 1949, also serving as Bulgaria's leader from 1946. In 1938 the party merged with the Bulgarian Workers' Party and took the former party's name. In 1948 the BWP reunited with the Social Democrats to become the Bulgarian Communist Party once again.