Festivities took place in the Bulgarian capital Sofia on the 100th anniversary of the opening of the city’s main synagogue, which is the third largest in Europe. Bulgaria’s President Georgi Parvanov and European Jewish Congress President Moshe Kantor were among the guest speakers at the ceremony. Kantor praised Bulgarians’ tolerance during and after World War II vis-à-vis the Jews and their courage in helping them from being deported to the Nazi death camps.

“It is especially symbolic for me to be in Bulgaria at this time, a country that, against all odds and against history itself, managed to save almost 50,000 Jewish Bulgarians from deportation and certain death,” Kantor said at a dinner in honor of President Parvanov. “For this the Jewish people are extremely grateful to those Bulgarians, including parliamentarians, the intelligentsia, orthodox priests and ordinary citizens who took a stand against tyranny and refused to sacrifice their fellow Bulgarians. Of course, we must not forget the fate of the Jews in Thrace and Macedonia, as well as elsewhere, who perished under the Nazis. They must not and will never be forgotten.”

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