The 120th anniversary of Ilinden reignited the dispute between Macedonia and Bulgaria – after Bulgarian President Rumen Radev came out with a position that Ilinden is a Bulgarian uprising.

But photographs from Sofia, of the subsequent celebrations of Ilinden, show that it was always considered to be a Macedonian uprising. in 1923, for example, thousands of Macedonians living in Sofia gathered to mark the anniversary of the uprising, and their signs clearly declare it as a Macedonian holiday. Newspaper articles from the time use the terms Macedonian nation and Macedonian holiday – even though they were published in Bulgaria.

The historic records also show that the uprising was not being linked with the Preobrazensko uprising in the region of Strandza, in south-east Bulgaria. Bulgaria insists that the two uprisings, that happened at roughly the same time, were tied and calls the events the Ilinden – Preobrazensko Uprising.