80 years ago, on 10-11 March 1943 Bulgaria's pro-Nazi government decided to defy Berlin and halt the deportation of Bulgaria's 50.000 Jews. This was down to the actions of one man - Dimitar Peshev.
Just two years later he faced Communist justice and found himself on trial for his life.
His niece Kaluda Kiradjieva remembered.
Steve
Beautifully made and expressed - a real insight into impossible compromises and the humanitarians who made crucial distinctions, rebellions. Brave.Thanks
Anthony Georgieff
A short yet very informative film about one of Bulgaria's most important figures in the rescue of Bulgaria's Jews in 1943. Dimitar Peshev is in the Righteous Among the Nations Hall of Fame at Yad Vashem, but his actions in 1943 and especially his sorry fate under Communism remain little known both in and outside Bulgaria. In a country whose school curricula do not include the Holocaust (if at all, is mentioned only in passing as part of the history of the Second World War), the background against which Peshev lived is essential in understanding how a deputy speaker of parliament could revolt against his government, at the height of a world war, and prompt real action to save real peoples' lives.The producers of this film are doing a great service to anyone interested in Europe's and the Balkans' recent history.For more on the background please look at this article:http://www.vagabond-bg.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2154%3Arescue-of-bulgarias-jews&catid=63%3Abulgaria-society&Itemid=13#.UT2KWhnwNCZ
Greenleaf
Does anyone know why Dimitar Peshev was in prison for just one year? While most of his colleagues were executed or spent decades in camps...
Historian
An admirable man, thanks for this! Why is he still largely unknown in his own country?!!