Ceausescu’s Brother a Suicide : 3 Other Relatives Arrested

VIENNA —  Marin Ceausescu, the older brother of executed Romanian leader Nicolae Ceausescu, was found dead at the Romanian Embassy in Vienna today after committing suicide, police said.

A police spokesman who refused to be identified said the 74-year-old diplomat, who reportedly headed Western European operations of the dreaded Romanian secret police, was found hanged in the basement of the embassy’s trade mission.

The spokesman said there were no indications that anyone else was involved in his death.

Authorities ordered an autopsy, the Austria Press Agency reported.

Little was known about Marin Ceausescu’s career until he was listed as the director of the Romanian presentation at the 14th International Engineering Fair in Brno, Czechoslovakia, in 1972.

In April, 1974, he moved to Vienna as chief of the Romanian Trade Agency.

A man who answered the telephone at the Romanian Embassy said he was not authorized to answer any questions about Ceausescu and added that no one else was available for comment.

The APA said the embassy in the last few days had repeatedly said Ceausescu was not there.

In its edition today, the Vienna daily Kurier reported that a spokesman for the trade mission had claimed Ceausescu had traveled to Bucharest out of concern for his family, particularly his daughters, Gabriela and Mihaela.

Kurier, referring to unspecified sources in the new Romanian government, alleged that Marin Ceausescu “managed the Romanian secret service headquarters for Western Europe in Vienna.”

Nicolae Ceausescu was executed with his wife, Elena, on Monday after he was found guilty of “grave crimes” during his harsh 24-year rule. The Communist dictator was toppled Friday after a popular uprising that began Dec. 15.

In Bucharest, troops seized three more of Nicolae Ceausescu’s relatives today in the dictator’s hometown.

Romanian soldiers and police arrested Ceausescu’s sister, Elena Barbulescu, and her son, Emil, as they hid in Ceausescu’s hometown of Scornicesti, the official Romanian news agency Agerpres said.

Arrested with them was the wife of Ceausescu’s brother Ilie, the ousted deputy defense minister, Agerpres said. It did not give her first name.

Checks worth about $50,000 and about $3,600 in cash were found in Elena Barbulescu’s possession, Agerpres said.

Elena Barbulescu is the wife of Vasile Barbulescu, who was Ceausescu’s agriculture chief and who is also under arrest. Ilie Ceausescu is also in custody.

Ceausescu’s son Nicu and daughter Zoia have been shown on television in detention. But their fate and the whereabouts of a second son, Valentin, are not known.

There have been reports that tens of thousands of people have been killed in the revolution that began with demonstrations nearly two weeks ago.

The Romanian Health Ministry has confirmed the deaths of only 746 people, but that would not include bodies not yet found.

It is believed that mass graves throughout the country contain the bodies of countless more who died in the demonstrations.