The Zarca and the Cellular

When, almost two years ago, at the urging of some friends, I decided to tackle the Aiud re-education and present it as I knew it and as I received it, I did so in the hope that this testimony of mine would contribute in some way to restoring the truth about what this Aiud re-education and all other such criminal actions initiated and controlled by the authorities in the communist prisons actually were.

This is all the more so because even at that time there were indications that the “good people” in the Romanian secret service and other structures of the new power in Romania intended to publish some documents and papers which could be used to denigrate and compromise some of the former political prisoners and the ideals for which they had fought and sacrificed. It is even said (I have not seen it) that the famous ‘White Book of Aiud’, which I have already mentioned, was exhibited at the Museum of Romanian Literature for anyone interested to consult, but was taken away after only 24 hours, for who knows what reason.

The fact that these indications were not mere rumours is proven by the publication, in the first half of this year (1995), of a volume entitled “The Memorial of Horror”, which contains part of the documents of the lawsuit brought by the moral authors of the re-education in the Pitești and Gherla prisons against the perpetrators, most of whom were first victims and then executioners. I say that the volume contains only a part of the documents of this trial, because it lacks the interrogations in court and the last word of the accused, as well as the testimonies of the witnesses, both defence and prosecution. The editors argue, unconvincingly, that the absence of some documents (the testimonies of the witnesses at the trial and the last word of the accused) ‘is due either to their absence from the file or to the stressful (sic!) conditions under which the selection of archival material took place’, while the absence of others (the interrogations of the accused in court) is due to the fact that they ‘were recorded by the court clerk in illegible handwriting … their deciphering entailed a risk of inaccuracy’. The publication of these documents would be absolutely necessary because it can be assumed that at least some of the accused would have retracted in court, during their interrogations or last words, the statements extracted under torture during the investigation, thus denouncing the legal frame-up that was taking place.

Because there was a legal frame-up, and this should have been made clear, I do not want to make a deliberate trial of the publishers of this volume, but I cannot fail to note that the publication of such documents, under the pretext of objectivity, in no way contributes to The publication of such documents, under the pretext of objectivity, does not contribute to “revealing the true picture of historical facts”, as the editors claim, but, on the contrary, perpetuates the confusion (so far skilfully maintained) surrounding them, while at the same time causing serious moral damage to the heroes of this terrible tragedy, turning them into victims for a second time.

The publication of these documents should have been accompanied by a number of clarifications. First of all, the reader should have been given an explanation of what re-education in the Pitești and Gherla prisons actually entailed and what exactly the Securitate authorities were trying to achieve by carrying out and judging this process. Then they should have been told about the bestial methods used to extract statements from the accused. They should also have been made aware of the draconian rules governing the daily life of prisoners in communist prisons. After the establishment of the Securitate (1949), and especially after the arrival of Soviet advisers (there were Soviet advisers even for prisons), not even the simple transfer of a prisoner from one cell to another was possible without the knowledge and approval of the Centre. Under these conditions, to claim that the prisoners in Pitești and Gherla prisons at the time could move from cell to cell on their own, set up torture or examination rooms on their own, and even procure (from where?) instruments of torture (bullwhips, clubs, spears, etc.) and writing utensils (paper, pens, ink, etc.) is simply to lie through one’s teeth in order to cover up one’s misdeeds. Last but not least, the editors of the book should have called on as many survivors of the terrible apocalypse as possible (I myself know at least ten former victims who would have been happy to testify) to come forward and give as precise and concise an account as possible of what Pitești and Gherla really were. The questions posed in Popa Alexandru’s letter, which remained unanswered, should also have been put to the other three or four witnesses who agreed to testify, as this would have avoided the digressions they made over dozens of pages, digressions that had nothing to do with the issue itself.

I must, however, note that in the lapidary ‘preface’ the editors warn the reader ‘that these documents are the emanation of the Communist authorities and, as such, strictly represent their point of view’. This warning, however, is too weak to warn the uninformed reader to pay attention and “weigh the truth that appears between the lines”, as the editors go on to say, especially since it (the warning) comes immediately after a paragraph that reads “The present collection is intended only as a source of naked information, a working tool”. If after such a “collection” (of documents) history will be written!… I have made this long digression because the re-education in Aiud is the continuation, in a different political context and with different means, of the one in Pitești, both with the same aim: to destroy political opponents by silencing their consciences and killing the idea that shaped those consciences. This being the case, it is not impossible that soon, under the pretext of objectivity, which has not yet been established, the documents of Aiud’s re-education (position papers, statements or even some of the “studies” I mentioned) will appear on the market, documents which, as they were obtained, were stuffed into Aiud’s now well-known “White Book” to serve (as Colonel Crăciun put it) posterity in the writing of history.

(Demostene Andronescu – Re-education in Aiud)