May 18, 1959
GREECE-BULGARIA: Permanent Deputy Foreign Minister Pericles Skeferis has handed the Bulgarian charge d’affaires a strongly worded communique in which the Greek government asks Bulgaria to pay war reparations in accordance with the terms of the 1947 peace treaty which provides for partial compensation of the enormous damage sustained on account of the Bulgarian invasion of Greece. The reparations were set at 45 million dollars in gold equivalent in July 1946, an amount which has now doubled in value. The communique adds that during the negotiations to resume bilateral diplomatic relations, it had been agreed that these would be followed by talks to decide the precise manner in which the reparations would be paid, but that the Bulgarian government had so far avoided entering into talks and had made every effort to obstruct the process. The communique calls on the Bulgarian government to restore to Greek citizens who had settled in Bulgaria before the treaty was signed all the property seized by Bulgaria on April 24, 1941, or else to pay the appropriate amount of compensation.
