On May 23, 2002, Pope John Paul II lands in Sofia. This is a key visit of the Holy Father, which aims to clear the name of Bulgaria from the accusations of participation in the assassination of Ali Agca.
During his visit, Pope John Paul met with President Georgi Parvanov and assured him that he never believed that Bulgaria was involved in the attack against him in May 1981.
For three days – from May 23 to 26, John Paul II has a program full of meetings, both with the representatives of state power and with intellectuals and with thousands of ordinary citizens from Sofia and Plovdiv.
A year earlier, the General People's Committee organized a national campaign in which they collected over twenty thousand invitations from Bulgarians, which were sent to the Pope.
On May 12, 2002, during the visit of our then Foreign Minister Solomon Passy to the Holy See, the Bulgarians heard the Pope's long-awaited statement: My visit to your country will aim to encourage the Catholic brothers and sisters in their faith and corresponds to my innermost desire to strengthen the ties between the Catholic Church and the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, BNR recalls.
I have never believed in the so-called “Bulgarian trail” in the attempted assassination of me. It was an insinuation and an injustice. This was stated by the Holy Father during his meeting with Georgi Parvanov.
Thus, Pope John Paul II exonerated the Bulgarians Sergey Antonov, Zhelyu Vassilev and Todor Aivazov, convinced by the assassin Ali Agja, of being the guarantors of the attempt.
Vasilev and Aivazov were in Bulgaria when the investigating judge Ilario Martela issued an order for their arrest.
Sergei Antonov, however, was arrested in Rome, investigated and handed over to an Italian court.
Regardless of the huge media hype, the evidence gathered by Martella turned out to be patchy and did not hold up in the scandalous trial that ultimately ended in acquittals.
The visit continues until May 26, when Pope John Paul II flies to Rome from Plovdiv airport. It is accompanied by draconian security measures.
The Holy Father even attended the celebrations on the occasion of the Day of Bulgarian Writing, traveled to the Rila Monastery.
On the last day of his visit, on May 26, he served a three-hour mass in the “Central“ square. in Plovdiv under exceptional security measures. He travels in a papamobile, but even the young Catholics with whom he talks after mass are amazed by his endurance. As a memory of his visit to Plovdiv, a plaque has been installed on the square.
After the four-day visit, Pope John Paul II provided a temple in Rome for the use of the Bulgarian Orthodox community.