Dozens of Bulgarians protested on May 18 against euro adoption, blocking key roads across the biggest cities.

The far-right, pro-Russian Vazrazhdane party has been calling for a national referendum and vows to resist the country’s planned entry into the eurozone.

Protesters held signs demanding the preservation of the national currency, the lev, and called for the government to resign.

The unrest follows a renewed push by Bulgarian President Rumen Radev to hold a referendum on the euro accession date. Although parliament dismissed the proposal, Radev has pledged to continue efforts for referendum. He is strongly supported by Vazrazhdane.

Radev has said he will refer parliament’s refusal to debate his request for a referendum to constitutional court. It is unclear whether the court would admit the request as it has already ruled once that such a referendum cannot be called.

Bulgaria’s constitution prohibits referendums on matters governed by international treaties, such as EU accession, which includes eurozone membership, prompting the Constitutional Court to reject a similar referendum initiative in 2024.

In addition to road blockades, tensions escalated at a conference titled ‘The Battle for the Lev Is the Final Battle for Bulgaria’, organised by a coalition of nationalist and pro-Russian figures, including former PIK media owner Nedialko Nedyalkov, MEP Petar Volgin, and former MPs Viktor Papazov and Strahil Angelov, Dnevnik news outlet reported on May 16.

Speakers threatened ‘uprisings’, calling for resistance and and claiming that entry to the eurozone would be a ‘national betrayal’.

Kostadin Kostadinov, leader of Vazrazhdane, hailed the conference as “the true National Assembly” and issued a rallying call for 100,000 people to flood the streets of Sofia on May 31.

“It is time to reclaim our freedom and our country,” he said as quoted by Dnevnik.

The protests are timed to coincide with the release of convergence reports by the European Commission and European Central Bank, due on June 4. It is widely expected that the reports will be positive and will allow Bulgaria to join the eurozone on January 1, 2026.