Poptomov, Vladimir Tomov

Born Jan. 27, 1890, in the village of Belitsa, Blagoevgrad District; died May 1, 1952, in Sofia. Bulgarian labor leader; government and political figure in the People’s Republic of Bulgaria. Member of the Communist Party of Bulgaria from 1912.

Poptomov served as a deputy to the National Assembly from 1920 to 1923. He took part in the September Antifascist Uprising of 1923 and emigrated in 1924. From 1925 to 1933 he was political secretary of the Unified Internal Macedonian-Odrin Revolutionary Organization and edited its central organ, Makedonsko delo. Beginning in 1934, Poptomov worked in Moscow in the Comintern apparatus. After the success of the September Armed Uprising of 1944, he returned to his homeland.

From 1945, Poptomov was a member of the Central Committee (CC) and the Politburo of the CC of the Bulgarian Communist Party (BCP). From 1945 to 1949 he was editor in chief of Rabotnichesko delo, the central organ of the BCP. Poptomov was chief secretary of the National Council of the Fatherland Front from February to October 1949, minister of foreign affairs in 1949–50, and deputy chairman of the Council of Ministers of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria from January 1950. He was a deputy to the National Assembly from 1945. Poptomov was the author of articles on the history of the revolutionary labor movement.