Politics sets the pace of the Eurovision

Ivaylo Dichev sees the results of the Eurovision Song Contest, in which Bulgaria came fifth, as political votes. "Those who were dismayed to see the break-up of Yugoslavia or the Soviet Union should take a look at Saturday's voting. ... By no means do I mean to imply that it was all down to national sympathies and that the whole thing wasn't interesting or objective, but somehow it was about more than music. You could even say Bulgaria no longer has any friends - at least there was no country that gave us its clear support. We weren't the first choice for Moldavia, Romania, Macedonia or Serbia. The Greeks put us first and Spain also gave us a relatively good score. But that was only to be expected because thousands of Bulgarian emigrants live there and they did as the Turks in Germany or the Netherlands [who voted for their home country]. ... It's surprising that Croatia gave its maximum points to Serbia, a country it fought a war with in the 1980s, and that Russia voted for Ukraine despite the serious ongoing conflicts between the two countries."

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