Death
Dimitrov died in 1949 in the Barvikha sanatorium near Moscow. The rising speculations that he had been poisoned have never been confirmed, although his health seemed to deteriorate quite abruptly. The supporters of the poisoning theory claim that Stalin did not like the "Balkan Federation" idea of Dimitrov and his closeness with Tito. A state consisting of Yugoslavia and Bulgaria would be too large and independent to be controlled by Moscow.
Opponents claim that Dimitrov was the most loyal "lap dog" of Stalin and Stalin did not have a real reason to kill him. Stalin never forgot the "betrayal" of Dimitrov. However, the anti-Yugoslav (anti-Titoist) trials and executions of Communist leaders orchestrated by Stalin in the Eastern Bloc countries in 1949 did little to calm these suspicions. Dimitrov's body was embalmed and placed on display in the Sofia Georgi Dimitrov Mausoleum. After the "fall of Communism" in Bulgaria, his body was buried in 1990 in the Central cemetery of Sofia. His mausoleum was torn down in 1999.
Read more about this topic: Georgi Dimitrov
Famous quotes containing the word death:
“For God was as large as a sunlamp and laughed his heat at us and therefore we did not cringe at the death hole.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)
“We like the chase better than the quarry.... And those who philosophize on the matter, and who think men unreasonable for spending a whole day in chasing a hare which they would not have bought, scarce know our nature. The hare in itself would not screen us from the sight of death and calamities; but the chase, which turns away our attention from these, does screen us.”
—Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)
“You don’t send a man to his death because you want a hero.”
—Paddy Chayefsky (1923–1981)