Alexandru Drăghici

Alexandru Drăghici (Romanian pronunciation: [alekˈsandru drəˈɡit͡ʃʲ]; September 27, 1913 – December 12, 1993) was a Romanian communist activist and politician. He was Interior Minister in 1952 and from 1957 to 1965, and State Security Minister from 1952 to 1957. In these capacities, he exercised control over the Securitate secret police during a period of active repression against other Communist Party members, anti-communist resistance members and ordinary citizens.

An industrial worker by profession, Drăghici made his entry into the underground communist movement around the age of twenty. He was arrested for illegal political activity, and spent time in prison before and during World War II. He was close to Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej's communist faction, and, as such, rose quickly through the Communist Party ranks. He joined the repressive apparatus shortly before the Romanian communist regime was officially established.

Drăghici was infamous especially for the various campaigns he initiated against selected groups that resisted Marxist-Leninism. He began early on, with purges of the youth movements and teaching staff, joined in the denunciation of Ana Pauker's communist faction, and then focused his attention on the Hungarian-Romanian community. Drăghici is also remembered for his participation in the show trial of Lucrețiu Pătrășcanu, his quashing of the "Ioanid Gang", and his clampdown on religious groups—both Roman Catholic and Romanian Orthodox.

Both Gheorghiu-Dej and Drăghici opposed de-Stalinization, but their talk of national communism and socialist patriotism signaled Romania's emancipation from the Soviet Union. Drăghici still had important assignments after Gheorghiu-Dej's death, but was bitterly opposed to emerging communist leader Nicolae Ceaușescu. Ceaușescu used his influence in the party to incriminate Drăghici of all publicly known Securitate crimes, then deposed him. Drăghici was not brought to justice, but lived in anonymity in the Bucharest area from 1968 to 1989. After the overthrow of communism, he lived his final years in Hungary with his family, despite Romanian efforts to have him extradited. Shortly before his death, a trial held in absentia convicted him of incitement to murder.