Bulgaria
After World War II the Bulgarian Communist Party was compelled by Joseph Stalin to accept the formation of Macedonian, Thracian and Dobrujan nations in order to include those new separate states in a Balkan communist federation. From 1947-1958 Bulgaria was forced to declare Macedonian the official language of Pirin Macedonia. Macedonian language newspapers were published and book houses were set up. Many teachers from the Socialist Republic of Macedonia were sent to Bulgaria to teach the Macedonian language. According to many scholars this was done despite the unwillingness of the local population to co-operate. After 1958 when the pressure from Moscow decreased, the campaign was abandoned and Sofia turned back to the view that the Macedonian language did not exist and that the Slavic population in Blagoevgrad province (Pirin Macedonia) was Bulgarian. All Macedonian language printing stopped and the language was no longer taught in Bulgaria.
The existence of a Macedonian language and Macedonian ethos is highly disputed in Bulgaria. Most Bulgarians do not recognize the Macedonian language as a separate language and assert that it is a dialect of Bulgarian. There are two dialects in Bulgaria which are considered Macedonian in Macedonia: the Maleševo-Pirin (widely spoken in most of Blagoevgrad Province in Bulgaria and Delčevo region in the Republic of Macedonia) and the Ser-Drama-Lagadin-Nevrokop ones. Some linguists consider these dialects to be transitional between modern Bulgarian and Macedonian.
According to the 2011 Bulgarian census, 1404 persons in Bulgaria and 561 in Blagoevgrad Province declared Macedonian as their native language.
Read more about this topic: Geographical Distribution Of The Macedonian Language