Happy 89th, Radio Bulgaria!

16 February marks the anniversary of BNR's multilingual programme

published on 2/16/25 7:35 AM

On February 16, Radio Bulgaria celebrates its 89th anniversary. Throughout these years, our multilingual media has been not only a channel of information, but also an invaluable link with our audience around the world. Today, Radio Bulgaria offers rich journalistic content, including programmes for the Bulgarian diaspora, as well as for foreigners in Bulgaria and abroad. We are active on social media in 11 languages and connect with our listeners through modern digital platforms. The greatest reward for our small team is the trust and affection of our numerous listeners and users from all over the world.

It all began on a Sunday in February when Bulgarian Radio, then called Radio Sofia, began broadcasting its first foreign language programmes to Europe, North Africa and North America. The first programmes were in Esperanto. A few months later, broadcasts in French, German, English and Italian were introduced. In 1938, so-called "special programmes for certain European countries" were also broadcast, advertised through embassies, commercial representatives, radio stations and newspapers.

After 9 September 1944, broadcasts in Bulgarian for foreign audiences were discontinued. They were not resumed until the late 1950s, initially for the Bulgarian diaspora in America. As a result of the so-called "revival process", which aimed to assimilate ethnic Turks by forcing them to change their names, programmes for ethnic groups in Turkish were suspended in December 1984 and resumed only after the democratic changes in Bulgaria.

In 1992, the foreign language programmes of Bulgarian National Radio were renamed Radio Bulgaria. In the following years, some language sections were closed, including Italian, Portuguese and Arabic.

Radio Bulgaria's first website was launched in 2004, offering content in 11 languages to reach an even wider audience. Today, we continue to tell stories about our country in English, German, French, Spanish, Russian, Serbian, Greek, Albanian, Turkish, Romanian and Bulgarian, through sound, text and images.

And feedback, like that from Erik van Driel from the Netherlands, shows that what we do makes a difference. He discovered BNR's international programme during the COVID-19 pandemic, and thanks to the foreign languages in which we offer our daily programme "Bulgaria Today", he became interested in our country and language. Erik van Driel sends his greetings and writes:

I listen with pleasure to your “Bulgaria Today” almost every day; most of the times when I’m walking after dinner. Over the years I have developed my interest in Bulgaria. This started in 2016, when I visited Bulgaria for the first time during a business trip.

My interest boosted during COVID lockdowns; in that time (2020) I discovered “Bulgaria Today” podcast. In 2023 I had the opportunity to make a private 3-week road trip throughout Bulgaria and followed a course at a language school in Sofia.

Your podcast (and BNR Bulgaria in general) is very valuable for me to improve my language skills step-by-step by listening to Bulgarian.

“Много ви благодаря” for the whole Team!!!

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Happy 89th, Radio Bulgaria!

16 February marks the anniversary of BNR's multilingual programme

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