Bulgarian occupation of Serbia (World War I)

Common card · No. 453573

The Bulgarian occupation of Serbia during World War I started in Autumn 1915 following the invasion of Serbia by the combined armies of Germany, Austria-Hungary and Bulgaria. After Serbia's defeat and the retreat of its forces across Albania, the country was divided into Bulgarian and Austro-Hungarian occupation zones. The Bulgarian occupation zone extended from modern-day Southern and Eastern Serbia, Kosovo and North Macedonia. The civilian population was exposed to various measures of repression, including mass internment, forced labor, and a Bulgarisation policy. According to academic Paul Mojzes: "it appears that ethnic cleansing (at a minimum) and genocide (at the maximum) did take place between 1915 and 1918", what historian Alan Kramer has termed a: "dynamic of destruction". The occupation ended in late September 1918, after the Allied offensive at Dobro Polje, spearheaded by Serbian and French forces, pierced the Bulgarian front and liberated Serbia.

Read on Wikipedia · Image Aeengath, CC BY-SA 4.0