Bulgarian diaspora in the context of "2007 enlargement of the European Union"

Thracians or Thracian Bulgarians (Bulgarian: Тракийски българи or Тракийци) are a regional, ethnographic group of ethnic Bulgarians, inhabiting or native to Thrace. Today, the larger part of this population is concentrated in Northern Thrace, but much is spread across the whole of Bulgaria and the diaspora.

Until the beginning of the twentieth century the Thracian Bulgarians were scattered in the whole of Thrace, then part of the Ottoman Empire. After the persecutions during the Preobrazhenie Uprising and the ethnic cleansing, caused to the Bulgarian population in Eastern Thrace after the Second Balkan War, these people were expelled from the area. After World War I, Bulgaria was required to cede Western Thrace to Greece. A whole population of Bulgarians in Western Thrace was expelled into Bulgaria-controlled Northern Thrace. This was followed by a further population exchange between Bulgaria and Greece (under the Treaty of Neuilly-sur-Seine), which radically changed the demographics of the region toward increased ethnic homogenization within the territories each respective country ultimately was awarded. At this period the Bulgarian Communist Party was compelled by Comintern to accept the formation of a new Thracian nation on the base of this people in order to include them in a new separate Thracian state, as a part of a future Balkan Communist Federation.

Macedonians (Bulgarian: македонци), or Macedonian Bulgarians (Bulgarian: македонски българи), sometimes also referred to as Macedono-Bulgarians, Macedo-Bulgarians, or Bulgaro-Macedonians, are a regional, ethnographic group of ethnic Bulgarians, inhabiting or originating from the region of Macedonia. This is how the majority of Slavic-speaking population of Macedonia had been referred to by most of the national conscious minority among them and by outside observers, from the 10th until the early 20th century in a sense of a demonym at first, and later as an social class synonym mainly, and as ethnonym. Since 1913, the Macedonian Bulgarian population is largely concentrated in Pirin Macedonia but much is spread across the whole of Bulgaria and the diaspora.