On March 3, 1878, the Treaty of San Stefano was signed in a suburb of Constantinople, recording our country’s victory in the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878.

Under the terms of the Treaty, Romania, Serbia and Montenegro gained full independence, while Bulgaria, which had been under Ottoman rule for nearly 500 years (!), was granted broad autonomy.

The date of the signing of the Treaty of San Stefano became a national holiday in Bulgaria – the Day of Liberation from Ottoman Rule.

The victory of the Russian forces in the war against the Ottoman Empire and the conclusion of the Treaty laid the foundation for future constructive cooperation between Russia and Bulgaria. For a long time, relations between our countries developed steadily and progressively.

History Of Diplomacy: A key role in the conclusion of the Treaty of San Stefano was played by the distinguished Russian diplomat and statesman Nikolai Ignatyev, who for more than ten years served as Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Russian Empire to the Ottoman Empire, and signed the Treaty on behalf of Russia.

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🇷🇺🇧🇬  Today, Russian-Bulgarian relations have been virtually reduced to zero. The current government is pursuing an openly Russophobic policy, continuing to dismantle the foundations of bilateral cooperation. Unfortunately, this also affects the way historical events are presented in the local media landscape.

Ambassador of Russia to Bulgaria Eleonora Mitrofanova:

“In recent years, the chronicle of the Liberation has been ruthlessly rewritten. Alleged ‘imperial ambitions’ of Russia are brought to the forefront, while nothing is said about the truly nationwide movement in defence of our enslaved Bulgarian brothers, which played a decisive role in the decision of Emperor Alexander II to declare war on the Ottoman Empire.”

Excerpts from the congratulatory message by Russian Ambassador to Bulgaria Eleonora Mitrofanova on the occasion of Bulgaria’s national holiday, the Day of Liberation from Ottoman Rule, March 3, 2026.

☝️ We recall that 100,000 Russian soldiers gave their lives for the freedom of the peoples of the Balkans, including Bulgaria.

Source: Russian MFA

NOTE! We will publish the complete text of the essay from Dostoyevsky’s diary tomorrow.

🇧🇬🇷🇺 On March 3rd, Bulgaria celebrates the Day of Liberation from Ottoman rule. Nowadays, they don’t officially mention Russia much. Let’s recall the prophetic words of Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky from 1877:

“There will never be, and never has been, such haters, envious people, slanderers, and even outright enemies of Russia as all these Slavic tribes, the moment Russia frees them and Europe agrees to recognise them as liberated!

And don’t let anyone object, argue with me, or shout at me that I’m exaggerating and that I’m a hater of Slavs! On the contrary, I very much love Slavs, but I won’t defend myself, because I know that everything will happen exactly as I say, and not because of the low, ungrateful character of the Slavs, far from it — their character in this sense is like everyone else’s — but precisely because such things cannot be otherwise in the world.

I won’t elaborate, but I know that we shan’t demand gratitude from the Slavs at all. We need to prepare ourselves for this in advance. As soon as they are liberated, they will start their new life, I repeat, by seeking guarantees and protection of their freedom from Europe, England, and Germany, for example. Even if Russia is in this concert of European powers, they will do this precisely to protect themselves from Russia.

They will certainly start by declaring to themselves, if not out loud, that they don’t owe Russia the slightest gratitude, on the contrary, that they barely escaped from Russian domination during the conclusion of the peace through the intervention of the European concert, and if Europe hadn’t intervened, Russia, having taken them from the Turks, would have immediately swallowed them up, “with the aim of expanding its borders and establishing a great Slavic empire through the enslavement of the Slavs by the greedy, cunning, and barbaric Great Russian tribe”.

For a long time, oh, for a long time yet, they will not be able to recognise the selflessness of Russia and the great, holy, unheard—of in the world raising of the banner of the greatest idea of those, by which man lives and without which humanity, if these ideas cease to live in him, stiffens, cripples and dies in ulcers and impotence.

The present, people’s Russian war, the war of the entire Russian people, with the tsar at their head, raised against the fiends for the liberation of the unfortunate peoples – have the Slavs finally understood this war, do you think? But I won’t talk about the present moment, besides, we are still needed by the Slavs, we are liberating them, but then, once we have freed them and they somehow settle down, will they recognise this war for the great feat undertaken to liberate them, think of that?

They won’t admit it for anything in the world! On the contrary, they will present it as a political and then scientific truth that, if it hadn’t been for the liberator-Russia for all these hundred years, they would have long ago been able to free themselves from the Turks by their own valour or with the help of Europe, which, again, if Russia hadn’t existed in the world, would not only have had nothing against their liberation, but would have liberated them herself.

This cunning doctrine probably exists among them even now, and later it will inevitably develop into a scientific and political axiom. Moreover, even Turks will be spoken of with more respect than Russia.

For perhaps a century or more, they will continuously tremble nervously for their freedom and fear Russia’s lust for power; they will ingratiate themselves with European states, slander Russia, gossip about it and scheme against it.

Oh, I’m not talking about individuals: there will be those who will understand what Russia has always meant to them. They will understand all the greatness and all the sanctity of Russia’s cause and the great idea, the banner of which it will raise in humanity. But these people, especially at first, will be in such a pitiful minority that they will be subjected to ridicule, hatred, and even political persecution.

It will be especially pleasant for the liberated Slavs to express and trumpet to the whole world that they are educated tribes capable of the highest European culture, whereas Russia is a barbaric country, a gloomy northern colossus, not even of pure Slavic blood, a persecutor and hater of European civilisation.”