Bulgarians all around the world are 14 million, 7.5 million in the country and 6.5 million outside it’s borders, and 3 million of those are the ones separated from Bulgaria and left in neighboring countries. This announcement was made by academician Grigor Velev, head of the organizational committee that works on the first Great convention of bulgarians from all around the world. The event will take place in Varna and will go on untill the November 3rd.

Acad. Velev added that the bulgarians are once again falling behind in terms of their spiritual unification and gave Greece, Albania and Macedonia as examples; they’ve already had numerous such conventions. The opening of the Great convention began with a performance of the national anthem and “Otche nash”.

The bishop of Varna and Veliki Preslav Kiril read a congratulating letter on behalf of the leader of the bulgarian orthodox church patriarch Maxim and blessed the initiative. The program of the event went on with a showing of the documentary “Who are we, bulgarians?” by Chavdar Gagov and Ivan Momchev.