The Black Sheep

Something strange had happened in Sofia. Rumors of a suicide in the Central Committee raced through the grim little capital. Had there been a plot against the government? A pro-Peking putsch, nipped in the bud by Russian agents? Or perhaps a pro-Tito rebellion aimed at making Bulgaria another "neutral" Yugoslavia?

The government huffily denounced all the rumors as "fantastic fabrications and malicious propaganda." To be sure, one government official had committed suicide: Ivan Todorov-Gorunya, 48, a wartime underground leader and a Central Committee member. "The truth is," insisted the report, "that on learning about his criminal activity being discovered, he fell into a deep depression and committed suicide." According to one source, the "deep depression" was the gulf between Todorov-Gorunya's Sofia apartment window and the street below.

On the Bridges. At least thirty other Bulgarians faced a different fate. The government communique admitted the "arrest of certain persons who have violated the laws of the country." Most prominent and potentially dangerous: General Tsvetko Anev, 53, commander of the Sofia army garrison.

According to gossipy Communist sources outside Bulgaria, it all stemmed from a plot aimed at removing tubby Premier Todor Zhivkov, long the staunchest friend of Moscow in all Eastern Europe. While General Anev's men occupied the capital's key bridges, communication centers and the airport, other plotters--supposedly to be led by Todorov-Gorunya--were to invade the Central Committee and arrest the eleven-man Politburo--including Zhivkov. But Soviet counterespionage agents got wind of the coup just in time.

Nascent Nationalism. At first, Sofia tried to make it appear that the plotters were members of a pro-Peking faction working against Bulgaria's Russian protectors. They even planted a story that General Anev had fled to sanctuary in Albania, Red China's nearby ally. But it was not that simple. Anev was actually captured in his native village near the Yugoslav border, in a region long noted for its opposition to foreign invaders--Russian or otherwise. There, 20 years ago, he and Todorov-Gorunya had led an anti-Nazi guerrilla group.

It all seemed to jibe with the recent appearance of anti-Russian slogans on the walls of Sofia, particularly an inscription reading "Za Levski"--a reference to Nationalist Leader Vasil Levski, hanged by Bulgaria's Turkish overlords in 1873. It would seem that Bulgaria, like the rest of Eastern Europe, has been infected with nascent nationalism. As one official tut-tutted last week in explanation of the upheaval: "There are black sheep in every flock."

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