On this day: The direct participants in the Bunovo station attack are sentenced to death

Important events have taken place on today’s date April 25 in history

On this day in 1988, the Supreme Court of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria sentenced to death by firing squad the direct participants in the Bunovo Station Attack.

The attack on Bunovo station is the largest railway bombing in Bulgarian history in terms of number of victims. It was committed on March 9, 1985 by means of a bomb placed in the carriage for mothers with children on the Burgas-Sofia train.

On the same day, a bomb exploded in the coffee shop of the “Sliven” hotel in Sliven.

The bomb was placed in the carriage for mothers with children on train No. 326, which runs from Burgas to Sofia. The bomb has a clock mechanism, and the time is calculated to coincide with the entry of the train into the tunnel in the Bunovo station area. There, panic and lack of sufficient air would result in the greatest possible number of casualties.

Due to a maneuver at Zlatica station, the train was delayed by two minutes and the explosion occurred at 21:31 at the station, not in the tunnel.

The Ministers of Internal Affairs and Transport Dimitar Stoyanov and Vasil Tsanov arrived at the scene of the accident. The wagon is unhinged. For six hours, the victims and the injured are transported to the surrounding towns, and the remaining passengers are subjected to a strict check by the law enforcement authorities – who and when bought the ticket, where they boarded and with what luggage. Only then does the train continue its journey to Sofia.

12-year-old Georgi Tsvetanov, 13-year-old Stefan Atanasov, 40-year-old Emil Georgiev, 63-year-old Nikolay Genkov and 64-year-old Raina Bozukova died in the attack. Among the victims are deaf and mute children on their way home. 9 people were seriously injured, including 2 children.

The assassination, as well as the one that followed it in the city of Sliven, was carried out by pro-Turkish terrorists, Bulgarian citizens, according to Pavel Shopov, members or sympathizers of the illegal organization called Turkish national liberation movement in Bulgaria (TNODB). This version is contested by Sabri Mehmedali, the brother of one of those sentenced to death.

On April 25, 1988, the persons directly involved in the attack were sentenced to death: Elin Madzharov (Emin Mehmedali), Altsek Chakarov (Abdula Chakar) and Sava Georgiev (Saafet Rejeb), a few months later the same year the sentence was confirmed by the State Council of The NRB and the condemned were executed and cremated. Emin Mehmedali (Elin Madzharov) and Abdullah Chakar (Alcek Chakarov) were agents of the district administration of State Security in Burgas in the 70s and 80s of the 20th century. Convicted for aiding and abetting are: 6 years in prison – Sevdalin Alipiev Madzharov (Sabri Mehmedali), brother of the first terrorist (he was in prison for 2 years, amnestied by Zhelyu Zhelev and released in 1990), 2 years in prison Nikola Nikolov, 1 year each Sevda Latinova and Milko Vulkanov prison. The terrorists became the subject of a deal with Turkey and were exchanged. Later, Sabri Mehmedali rose to the position of regional coordinator of the DPS for Burgas.

In 1990, a commemorative plaque was unveiled at the Bunovo station building. On September 11, 2007, a monument to the victims of the attack was opened near the station. The monument is a monumental sculptural composition, 7 meters high.

Here are other events that have happened on today’s date, April 25, in the past:

1154 – Muslim troops led by Nur ad Din capture Damascus.

1699 – The wedding of the German Count Ludwig Kraft von Nassau-Saarbrücken and Countess Filipina Henrietta von Hohenlohe-Langenburg takes place.

1719 – The novel was first published Robinson Crusoe of Daniel Defoe.

1792 – Frenchman Claude-Joseph de Lille composed the music and lyrics of The Marseillaise – anthem of France since 1795

1792 – France introduced the guillotine as a means of capital punishment.

1826 – The first car with an internal combustion engine was patented in England.

1859 – Construction of the Suez Canal begins.

1898 – The US declares war on Spain, in which the US gains control of Spain’s colonial islands in the Caribbean and Pacific.

1901 – New York State was the first in the USA to introduce vehicle registration numbers.

1902 – The Bulgarian Hospital in Tsarigrad was inaugurated.

1925 – Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli, the future Pope John XXIII, arrived in Sofia as Apostolic Nuncio.

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1953 – The American James Watson and the Englishman Francis Crick present in a scientific paper the double helix of DNA.

1961 – American entrepreneur Robert Noyce patented the integrated circuit.

1965 – Svatopluk Pluskal played his last football match.

1966 – Tashkent suffered a severe earthquake; the central part is destroyed, the restoration takes 3.5 years.

1974 – The Carnation Revolution in Portugal caused the fall of the fascist regime, succeeded by the dictatorship of Antonio de Oliveira Salazar.

1977 – The constitution of the United Republic of Tanzania was adopted.

1980 – British heavy metal band Black Sabbath released the album Heaven and Hell.

1983 – Pioneer 10 passes beyond the orbit of Pluto.

1989 – James Richardson is released from a Florida prison 21 years after being wrongly accused of murdering his seven children.

2005 – Bulgaria and Romania sign the Treaty of Accession to the European Union.

2005 – 107 people died when a passenger train derailed near Osaka (Japan).

2006 – Georgi Vassilev was appointed as the head coach of PFC Naftex (Burgas).

2007 – President Boris Yeltsin is buried with a church funeral, the first time this has happened in Russia since the funeral of Emperor Alexander III in 1894.

2012 – Ukrainian singer Ruslana released her 8th studio album Euphoria