Alexandru Drăghici

Who is Alexandru Drăghici?

Alexandru Drăghici 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's negative fame rests especially on his initiation of various campaigns 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.