Greek-Bulgarian Border Clashes 1931

In 1930 an unofficial Balkan conference was convened in Athens on the initiative of Republican Union leader Alexandros Papanastasious, a political ally of Greek prime minister Eleftherios Venizelos. It was attended by delegates from Greece, Turkey, Yugoslavia, Rumania, Albania, and even Bulgaria. The delegates agreed on a number of resolutions in favor of cultural and economic cooperation. It was even agreed that foreign ministers of the six states present should meet once a year to exchange views. However, progress was stalled when Bulgaria raised the question of Macedonia. The Bulgarian government, led by Andrei Liapchev, remained dissatisfied by the settlement imposed at the end of the First World War.

During January-February 1931 there were new incidents (skirmishes) along the border between Bulgaria and Greece. The tense situation again drew international intervention to prevent escalation of the conflict. Mediation by the League of Nations resolved the crisis.

In June 1931, Bulgaria held free elections for the first time since 1923 and the governing coalition under the leadership of Liapchev lost massively. Electoral victory went to the People's Bloc, composed of a number of allied political parties. A new government was formed under the leadership of Alexander Malinov.

There followed a second, third and fourth Balkan conference in the following years; but a fifth conference, scheduled for 1934, had to be cancelled because of uneasy relations between Bulgaria and her neighbors. The unsettled questions concerned war debts, minorities and even the terms of the peace treaties, whose revision was demanded by the successive Bulgarian governments and rejected by both the Greeks and the Yugoslavs. As the other Balkan countries moved towards a Balkan entente, Bulgaria became increasingly isolated as the one dissatisfied power. Later in 1934, Greece joined Romania, Yugoslavia and Turkey in forming the Balkan Pact, in part, to contain perceived Bulgarian revisionism.

References

Military History, 1137; Timelines of War, 416; Columbia History of Eastern Europe in the Twentieth Century, 89; Modern Greece: A Short History, 220-1; Outcast Europe: The Balkans 1789-1989, 104; League of Nations: Chronology 1931; Bulgaria - A Country Study.

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