Todor Aleksandrov

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Todor Aleksandrov Poporushov, best known as Todor Alexandrov (

In 1903, Aleksandrov distinguished himself as an extraordinary leader and organizer of the Kočani Revolutionary District. He was arrested by the Ottoman authorities on 3 March 1903 and sent to Skopje under enforced police escort during the same night. He was sentenced to five years of solitary confinement by the extraordinary court there. In April 1904, he was released after an amnesty. Soon afterwards, he was appointed a head teacher in the Second high-school in Štip. Aleksandrov, in co-operation with Todor Lazarov and Mishe Razvigorov, worked day and night to organize the Štip Revolutionary District. The results of his activities were detected by the Ottoman authorities and in November 1904 he was forbidden to teach. On 10 January 1905, Aleksandrov's house was surrounded by a numerous troops but he succeeded in breaking through the military cordoned and immediately joined the cheta (band) of Mishe Razvigorov where he became its secretary. Aleksandrov attended the First Congress of the Skopje Revolutionary Region as a delegate from the Štip district.^{[citation needed]}

His deteriorating health lead him to become a teacher in Bulgaria — the Black Sea town of Burgas in 1906, but after learning about the death of Mishe Razvigorov, he abandoned his work as a teacher and returned to Macedonia at once. In November 1907, Aleksandrov was elected as a district vojvoda (commander) by the Third Congress of the Skopje Revolutionary District.^{[citation needed]}

On 2 August 1909, the Ottomans made another attempt to arrest him but failed again. In the spring of 1910, he and his cheta traversed the Skopje region and organized the revolutionary activities. In early 1911, Aleksandrov became a member of the Central Committee of the IMARO. In 1912, he became a vojvoda in the Kilkis and Thessaloniki districts where he carried out a number of sabotages against Ottoman targets, facilitating this way the Bulgarian cause in the First Balkan War. He supported the Bulgarian Army.^{[citation needed]}

In 1913, he was at the headquarters of the Third brigade of the Macedonian Militia in the Bulgarian army. After 1913 he organized the IMARO resistance against other nationalities, such as Serbs and Greeks. With the inclusion of Bulgaria in the First World War in October 1915, Todor Alexandrov was mobilized. At that time, the structures of the Military Defense Forces completely merged into the structure of the Bulgarian army. Aleksandrov himself made considerable efforts to organize the administration in the territories occupied by Sabia. On 4 November 1919, Aleksandrov was arrested by the government of Aleksandar Stamboliyski but he succeeded to escape nine days later. In the spring of 1920, Aleksandrov went with a cheta to Vardar Macedonia where he restored the revolutionary organization and attracted the world's attention to the unsolved Macedonian question. At the end of 1922, there was a bounty of 250,000 dinars placed on him by the Serbian authorities in Belgrade.^{[citation needed]}

In 1924 IMRO entered negotiations with the

Failing to secure Alexandrov's cooperation, the Comintern decided to discredit him and published the contents of the Manifesto on 28 July 1924 in the "Balkan Federation" newspaper. Todor Aleksandrov and Aleksandar Protogerov promptly denied through the Bulgarian press that they have ever signed any agreements, claiming that the May Manifesto was a communist forgery. Shortly after, Alexandrov was assassinated in unclear circumstances, when a member in his cheta shot him on 31 August 1924 in the Pirin Mountains. He had a wife called Vangelia and two children (Alexander and Maria; a strong proponent of her father's ideals and IMRO's charter).^[13]

View about the Macedonian Question

IMRO and Alexandrov himself aimed at an autonomous Macedonia, with its capital at

A local association of Bulgarians raised a monument of the revolutionary on 2 February 2008 in the city of Veles.^[18][19] After the local administration refused to provide a place for the bust, it was raised in the yard of a local Bulgarian resident.^[20] In the following night the resident received a number of threats and the monument was twice thrown down by unknown individuals.^[21] Soon after, the monument was removed at the insistence of local authorities, as an unlawful construction. This incident caused Bulgarian president Georgi Parvanov to call upon the Macedonian government to review the history of Alexandrov's deeds on his meeting with Branko Crvenkovski in the town of Sandanski.^[22]

In June 2012, a new statue called “Macedonian Equestrian Revolutionary” was erected in Skopje. As a consequence, an outcry among older residents erupted almost immediately when they noted the anonymous rider’s similarity to the historical figure.^[23] Earlier the same month the opposition Social Democrats took to the streets to protest the changing of hundreds of street names, including a bridge that was to be named after Aleksandrov.^[24] In October, a few months after the setting of the monument, on it appeared a board with the name of Todor Aleksandrov.^[25]

In the spring of 2021, the new Skopje municipal council majority by the Social Democratic Union of Macedonia decided to rename the names of many local sites. Thus, the bridge named after Alexandrov and the street named after the organization he led - IMRO, were renamed.^[26] The former Skopje Mayor from VMRO-DPMNE Koce Trajanovski reacted that his successor Petre Šilegov has deleted part from the Macedonian history at the request of Bulgaria.^[27]

Honours

Aleksandrov Peak on Graham Land, Antarctica is named after Todor Aleksandrov.

Memorials

• 
  Monument of Alexandrov in Kyustendil, Bulgaria.
• 
  Monument of Alexandrov in Burgas, Bulgaria.
• 
  Monument of Alexandrov in Veles, Macedonia, demounted in 2008.
• 
  Bust of Todor Aleksandrov in Sofia, Bulgaria.

See also

• History of North Macedonia
• History of Bulgaria

References and notes