The Prosecutor General requested the head of state’s approval to start a new investigation into crimes against humanity allegedly committed by former President Ion Iliescu when he ordered a crackdown on protesters in 1990.
Prosecutor General Alex Florenta on Wednesday requested President Klaus Iohannis’s approval to start a renewed crimes against humanity investigation into former President Ion Iliescu’s role in violent attacks on anti-government protesters by miners acting on behalf of the authorities in June 1990 in Bucharest.
Iliescu was originally ordered by the Military Prosecutor’s Office in 2017 to stand trial for crimes against humanity, alongside the former director of the Romanian Intelligence Service, Virgil Magureanu.
But the High Court of Cassation and Justice found that the indictment was invalid and returned the case to the Military Prosecutor’s Office for reinvestigation in 2020.
Prosecutors have since had to review the entire proceedings and ask for approval from the head of state for a new indictment of Iliescu.
They allege that Iliescu, along with the Interior Ministry, Defence Ministry and Romanian Intelligence Service, ordered miners from the Jiului Valley to come to Bucharest to suppress peaceful protests against the new government that was installed after the anti-Communist revolution of 1989.
The miners who came to Bucharest beat up demonstrators and smashed up the headquarters of opposition parties in Bucharest, including the National Liberal Party and the National Peasant Party.
The protesters were mainly rallying for the adoption of legislation to ensure that no former Romanian Communist Party or Securitate intelligence service official had the right to work in public positions for ten years or three consecutive parliaments, particularly in the position of president.
The prosecutors claim that the protesters were peaceful until the state authorities decided to summon the miners to launch their violent attack in University Square in Bucharest on June 13, 1990.
During the violence, four people were shot dead, 1,388 people injured and 1,250 people were detained on political grounds, according to prosecutors. However, associations representing victims of the crackdown claim that the number of dead could be more than 100.
Iliescu, now 94 years old, was the first president of post-Communist Romania after the 1989 revolution, which overthrew the dictatorial regime led by Nicolae Ceausescu.
Iliescu denies involvement in any wrongdoing related to the unrest and has not appeared publicly since 2017, when he went to the General Prosecutor’s Office after being initially charged in the case.
There were several so-called ‘mineriade’ protests involving miners who came to the capital and got involved in violent altercations in the wake of the 1989 revolution. The first three happened in 1990, followed by one in 1991 and two more in 1999.
