Bulgaria

Bulgaria (pronounced /bʌlˈɡɛəriə/ ( listen); Bulgarian: България, Bălgariya, pronounced [bəlˈɡarija]), officially the Republic of Bulgaria, is a country in the Balkans in south-eastern Europe. Bulgaria borders five other countries: Romania to the north (mostly along the River Danube), Serbia and the Republic of Macedonia to the west, and Greece and Turkey to the south. The Black Sea defines the extent of the country to the east. With a territory of 110,994 square kilometers, Bulgaria ranks as the third largest country in Southeast Europe. Its landscape is defined by several mountains and mountain ranges, most notably the Stara Planina (Balkan) and Rodopi mountain ranges, as well as Rila mountain, where the highest peak in the Balkan region, Musala, is located. In contrast, the Danubian plain in the north and the Upper Thracian Plain in the south represent Bulgaria's lowest and most fertile regions. The 378-kilometer Black Sea coastline covers the entire eastern bound of the country. The emergence of a unified Bulgarian national identity and state dates back to the 7th century AD. All Bulgarian political entities that subsequently emerged preserved the traditions (in ethnic name, language and alphabet) of the First Bulgarian Empire (632/681 1018), which at times covered most of the Balkans and spread its alphabet, literature and culture among the Slavic and other peoples of Eastern Europe. Centuries later, with the decline of the Second Bulgarian Empire (1185 1396/1422), Bulgarian kingdoms came under Ottoman rule for nearly five centuries. The Russo-Turkish War of 18771878 led to the re-establishment of a Bulgarian state as a constitutional monarchy in 1878, with the Treaty of San Stefano marking the birth of the Third Bulgarian State. In 1908, with social strife brewing at the core of the Ottoman Empire, the Alexander Malinov government and Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria formally proclaimed the full sovereignty of the Bulgarian state at the ancient capital of Veliko Turnovo. After World War II, in 1945 Bulgaria became a communist state and part of the Eastern Bloc. Todor Zhivkov dominated Bulgaria politically for 33 years, from 1956 to 1989. In 1990, after the Revolutions of 1989, the Communist Party gave up its monopoly on power and Bulgaria undertook a transition to democracy and free-market capitalism. Bulgaria functions as a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic. A member of the European Union, NATO, the United Nations and the World Trade Organization, it has a high Human Development Index of 0.840, ranking 61st in the world in 2009. Freedom House in 2008 listed Bulgaria as "free", giving it scores of 1 (highest) for political rights and 2 for civil liberties. ( source Wikipedia )