In Memoriam
19 January 2015 News
On January 18, 2015 longtime Bulgarian diplomat Ambassador Zdravko Velev passed away. Ambassador Velev was born on February 23,1940 in Plovdiv, graduated from the Arab studies department of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations in 1967 and for the next 40 years he has worked at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with a long career path from attaché to ambassador.
Ambassador Velev was a longtime head of Arab States department, subsequently Middle East and North Africa department at the MFA (1990-1999), deputy head of the Bulgarian diplomatic mission in Tripoli at the end of the 70s, twice Bulgarian Ambassador to Yemen (1986-1989; 1999-2002). He completed his diplomatic career as Ambassador of the Republic of Bulgaria to Libya (2003-2006) in the final stage of the case against the Bulgarian medics.
One of the first Bulgarian Arabists at the Foreign Ministry, Ambassador Zdravko Velev was a leading figure in the Bulgarian foreign policy in the Arab world in decades of wars and conflicts in the Middle East, of ups and downs in the Bulgarian-Arab relations.
Ambassador Zdravko Velev will be remembered as erudite diplomat, profound expert on Arab world, language and culture with a significant contribution to the growth of several generations of Bulgarian diplomats-Arabists.
Rest in peace!
The funeral and memorial service will take place on Tuesday, January 20, at 11:30am., in St. George church on Patriarch Evtimii Blvd in Sofia.