Prison Experiences in Communist Romania

The Institute for the Investigation of Communist Crimes and for the Memory of the Romanian Exile aims at completing the general picture of the communist regime by editing interviews taken from about 250 former political prisoners who had not recounted their prison experiences so far. These interviews present the prisoners’ accounts on the setting up of communism, the arrest reasons and methods or the way that the inquiries and the trials took place. Details of their imprisonment as well as of their release and further socio-professional reinsertion are also included. The testimonies focus on detainment-related elements such as persecution methods, food, cell descriptions or religious life (etc.), thus creating vivid images of both prisoners and prison life.

Full agreement of witnesses considering any further usage or publication. The present-day keeper of this interviewing archive is the Institute for the Investigation of Communist Crimes and for the Memory of the Romanian Exile.