Bulgaria Tumbles Communist Monopoly

Parliament voted today to abolish the Communist Party’s political monopoly and agreed to discuss further constitutional changes with the opposition, which is demanding a swifter transition to democracy.

Lawmakers, following the lead of colleagues in East Germany and Czechoslovakia, voted unanimously to delete clauses in the constitution that for 44 years guaranteed Communist supremacy in Bulgaria.

On Sunday, more than 50,000 people rallied in Sofia to keep up the pressure on legislators and demand the immediate dismissal of Old Guard Communists still in positions of leadership. They chanted “Communists resign! Resign!”

Parliament was also expected to adopt a declaration backing the restoration of the rights of the Turkish-speaking minority that arose from talks last week among Communists, opposition figures, nationalist leaders and ethnic Turks.

The declaration aims to defuse ethnic tensions between Slavic nationalists and members of Bulgaria’s estimated 1.2 million ethnic Turks.

Lawmakers also adopted a proposal by Andrev Lukanov, the No. 2 official in the Communist Party, to set up the group that is to join lawmakers and opposition figures in drafting proposed further constitutional changes.

The changes, which are likely to include scrapping the reference to Bulgaria as a “socialist state . . . headed by the working class,” are to be voted on when Parliament next meets in February.

The country’s new president and party leader, Petur Toshev Mladenov, is under pressure from pro-democracy opposition forces to speed reforms.

The demonstrators on Sunday demanded a “government of national accord” and the resignation of Premier Georgi Attanassov, a holdover from the hard-line rule of Todor Zhivkov, who was ousted Nov. 10 after 34 years in power.

Leaders of the pro-democracy opposition Union of Democratic Forces also read excerpts from a declaration agreed upon Friday by nationalists, Communists and opposition representatives aimed at ending ethnic discord.