[1] Vladimir's father, Toma Popiliev, was a Bulgarian exarchate priest who for 15 years headed the Bulgarian church and school community and was one of the leaders of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization in Belitsa, killed by the Ottoman authorities.

In 1914 he graduated from the School of Reserve Officers in Sofia and during the First World War he served as a junior lieutenant in the Bulgarian Army.

Poptomov took part in the leadership of the BKP in Petrich and Gorna Jumae, in 1920 he was elected a deputy.

In 1936, a Bulgarian court sentenced in absentia to twelve years and six months in the process of IMRO.

[2] After the coup on September 9, 1944, Poptomov returned to Bulgaria and became a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the BCP.