Miron Cozma, former leader of the miners from Valea Jiului, came before the Prosecutor General’s Office on Monday to be heard in the the Miners’ Riots criminal case known as ‘Mineriade’ of June 1990, in which he is accused of committing crimes against humanity.

„Which Mineriada? You all support Iliescu. There was no Mineriada. You killed them in Bucharest. You with Iliescu. I wasn’t in Bucharest on June 13. Who killed those in University Square? I wasn’t in Bucharest, what it is that you don’t understand?,” Miron Cozma scolded the journalists present at the Prosecutor’s Office, who asked the former miners’ leader about his involvement in the repression of the demonstrators in Bucharest.

In this case, former president Ion Iliescu, former prime minister Petre Roman, former deputy prime minister Gelu-Voican Voiculescu, Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI) director Virgil Magureanu, Adrian Sarbu, Miron Cozma, former generals Vasile Dobrinoiu and Peter Petre are being prosecuted.

Prosecutors are due to reopen the investigation into the case after the evidence gathered by investigators was annulled in court.

Initially, in June 2017, former president Ion Iliescu was indicted for crimes against humanity, along with former prime minister Petre Roman and former SRI director Virgil Magureanu, but in December 2020, the High Court of Cassation and Justice decided to return the case to the Military Prosecutor’s Office, to start the investigation from scratch.

The judges then decided to annul all the evidence gathered by the prosecutors, finding that the indictment by which Ion Iliescu was sent to trial, along with Petre Roman, Gelu Voican Voiculescu, Virgil Magureanu, General (res.) Mugurel Cristian Florescu, Admiral (res.) Emil „Cico” Dumitrescu (deceased in the meantime), Cazimir Ionescu, Adrian Sarbu and Miron Cozma was unlawful.

The military prosecutors alleged that, on 11 and 12 June 1990, the state authorities decided to launch a violent attack against the demonstrators in Bucharest’s University Square, who were mainly campaigning for the adoption of point 8 of the Timisoara Proclamation and were peacefully expressing their political opinions, in contradiction with those of the majority in power at the time.

In this attack, forces of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of National Defence, the SRI, as well as more than 10,000 miners and other workers from several areas of the country were allegedly illegally involved.

According to the Military Prosecutor’s Office, the attack was carried out on the morning of 13 June 1990, with the following consequences: four people shot dead, two people raped, 1,388 people physically or mentally injured, 1,250 people deprived of their fundamental right to freedom for political reasons.

During this action, more than 200 persons were picked up and transported to a military unit of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Magurele, where they were held until the afternoon of the same day, when they were let go, after a brief investigation.

Ion Iliescu was accused by military prosecutors of having given the order for the forced evacuation of the demonstrators from the University Square, including the use of workers from large enterprises in Bucharest.

AGERPRES