‎Bulgaria’s President Rumen Radev has expressed his condolences to King Charles III, to the British royal family and the residents of the United Kingdom on the passing of Queen Elizabeth II. ‎

"With her death, Great Britain and the world are losing a remarkable stateswoman who marked an entire era with her life and deeds," President Radev said in his letter of condolences. The head of state notes that Queen Elizabeth II ranks among the great personalities in history who had the opportunity to lead their people with wisdom and strong statesmanship in complex times of the historical development of humanity. ‎

The British Embassy in Sofia and the British Ambassador's residence are with flags at half-mast as a sign of mourning. Yesterday evening, after the news of the Queen’s passing came out, Bulgarians came to the embassy to pay their respects to her memory and leave bouquets of flowers. ‎

‎"She was a symbol of constancy in some very volatile times. ‎When she became Queen, the Prime Minister of Great Britain was Winston Churchill, ‎who was born in 1874. A few days ago, she entrusted the formation of a cabinet to the new Prime Minister Liz Truss, who is born 1975. Huge changes took place. The British Empire became the British Commonwealth, cultural revolutions took place." This is what diplomat Stefan Tafrov, former Bulgarian ambassador to Great Britain, said in an interview with BNR. ‎

“She was a person who threw a bridge between 3 centuries”, Dr. Boris Stoyanov from the Faculty of History of Sofia University said for the BNR. ‎ 

"Without a doubt, she was the product of an era that carries the spirit, the conservatism, the moral code of the end of the 19^th and the very beginning of the 20^th century. At the same time, during her life she had to bear and reflect the marks of suffering, of division, of change, of the dissolution of manners, with which the 20^th century was characterized. Her life as a monarch was dominated by the shadow of the Cold War and nuclear apocalypse. She also lived through this time, so that the era of open borders, of the global world could come," adds the researcher. ‎

Compiled by Ivo Ivanov
Editing by Darina Grigorova

English version Rositsa Petkova