Thracian Bulgarians
Thracians or Thracian Bulgarians (Bulgarian: Тракийски българи or Тракийци) are a regional, ethnographic group of ethnic Bulgarians, inhabiting or native to Thrace. Today, the larger part of this population is concentrated in Northern Thrace, but much is spread across the whole of Bulgaria and the diaspora.

Until the beginning of the twentieth century the Thracian Bulgarians lived also in the whole of Thrace, then part of the Ottoman Empire. After the persecutions during the Preobrazhenie Uprising and the ethnic cleansing, caused to the Bulgarian population in Eastern Thrace after the Second Balkan War, these people were expelled from the area. After World War I, Bulgaria was required to cede Western Thrace to Greece. A whole population of Bulgarians in Western Thrace was expelled into Bulgaria-controlled Northern Thrace. This was followed by a further population exchange between Bulgaria and Greece (under the Treaty of Neuilly-sur-Seine), which radically changed the demographics of the region toward increased ethnic homogenization within the territories each respective country ultimately was awarded. At this period the Bulgarian Communist Party was compelled by Comintern to accept the formation of a new "Thracian nation" on the base of this people in order to include them in a new separate "Thracian state", as a part of a future Balkan Communist Federation.

The last flow of Thracian refugees into Bulgaria was as the Bulgarian Army pulled out of the Serres-Drama region in late 1944.

With the accession of Bulgaria into the European Union, Bulgarian authorities appear to revisit the issue as a precondition for Turkey's membership to the Union.
Q7918
Bulgarian
Concept
Q132151
ethnographic
Concept
Q133255
Bulgarians
Concept
Q41741
Thrace
LOC
Q3129678
Northern Thrace
LOC
Q219
Bulgaria
LOC
Q4996249
diaspora
Concept
Q41741
Thrace
LOC
Q12560
Ottoman Empire
LOC
Q1145682
Preobrazhenie Uprising
EVE
Q154278
ethnic cleansing
Concept
Q171323
Eastern Thrace
LOC
Q184183
Second Balkan War
EVE
Q361
World War I
EVE
Q1192701
Western Thrace
LOC
Q269267
Treaty of Neuilly-sur-Seine
MEDIA
Q155000
Bulgarian Communist Party
ORG
Q163931
Comintern
ORG
Q1262881
Balkan Communist Federation
MEDIA
Q206957
Serres
LOC
Q212841
Drama
LOC
Q814935
Turkey's membership to the Union
MEDIA
Q2429420
Thracian Bulgarians
PER
Q2429420
Thracian Bulgarians
PER
1944-01-01T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
1944
DATE
subclass of
native language
country