Protocol no. 5 of March 12, 1932. A legal approach with delayed effects on bilateral investigation of incidents at the Romanian Bulgarian border

Abstract

In 1923, the Dobrogean Revolutionary Internal Organization – V.D.R.O. was created by reorganizing the revolutionary section of „Dobrogea” Society. Amid intervention by the Bulgarian authorities informed that the leaders of this group, influenced by the Bulgarian communists, were planning to start a revolt in the autumn of 1925, the Dobrogean Internal Revolutionary Organization – V.D.R.O split, creating a new organization called the Dobrogean Revolutionary Organization – D.R.O. – under communist coordination. From this moment, internally, a strong rivalry began between these terrorist organizations, V.D.R.O and D.R.O. Therefore, between 1925 and 1932, the irredentist activity of Bulgarian counties was reflected in numerous border incidents, investigated by joint military commissions, exchanges of fire between Romanian and Bulgarian border guards, mainly caused by fraudulent crossings of Bulgarian counties, who robbed the Romanian peasants of the villages near the Romanian-Bulgarian border and killed the Romanian border guards who surprised them as they tried to cross the border. In order to stop these events and their investigation in a good collaboration by both parties, in 1932, a protocol agreed by the Government of Romania and Bulgaria was concluded and signed, known as Protocol no. 5, which sought to implement a simple procedure and methodology adapted to a concrete situation in the joint investigation of border incidents.