Five years ago, Bulgaria applied for an IDN but was denied by ICANN on the basis of “string similarity” with the country code of Brazil.
Here is the Bulgarian IDN side by side with Brazil’s ccTLD: бг br.
String similarity is a complex and controversial issue. But Bulgaria refused to take no for an answer and, five long years later, received approval.
I’ve updated our IDN map to include Bulgaria’s IDN (see detail above).
There are now 33 country/regions with IDNs.