Bulgarian Prime Minister Kiril Petkov and his party “We Continue the Change” (PP, Prodalzhavame Promyanata) – Pro-West darlings, self-proclaimed heroes in the fight against corruption and for liberal democratic values – lost a vote of no-confidence in the National Assembly on 22 June, with 123 in support to 116 against.

The 11 July Bulgarian parliamentary elections dislodged the right-wing GERB (“Citizens for the European Development of Bulgaria”) party from power. Deep divisions in the ruling class now threaten to transform a crisis of the regime into one of the whole political system.

A year of revolutionary uprisings in Bulgaria has culminated this week in further mass protests calling for the removal of the government. On Sunday 10th November students of the country’s largest university in Sofia declared “total and effective occupation” and joined thousands of others on the ‘March for Justice’ through the centre of the capital.

Austerity policies imposed by governments throughout Eastern Europe are provoking social convulsions in one country after another. In a short span of time we have seen mass opposition arising in Hungary, Slovenia (where a public sector general strike paralysed the country on January 23), Croatia, the Czech Republic, Romania and elsewhere. Mass protests have erupted also in Bulgaria. On Tuesday, February 19, a demonstration in Sofia against austerity measures and high energy prices escalated in clashes after harsh police intervention, resulting in 25 people injured.