Doru-Viorel Ursu

Doru-Viorel Ursu (1 March 1953 – 14 April 2024) was a Romanian politician and lawyer. A member of the National Salvation Front (FSN), he was minister of the interior in the Petre Roman cabinets, carrying his mandate between the Mineriads of 1990 and 1991.

Biography Born in Turnu Severin, Ursu graduated from the University of Bucharest's Faculty of Law, and later received his PhD from the same institution. He worked for the Bucharest Military Tribunal, serving as its vice president and, later, its president. This came in the wake of the June 1990 Mineriad, when miners from the Jiu Valley repressed the civic protest in Bucharest's University Square (known as the Golaniad). Ursu's alleged involvement in the events remains the topic of controversy, and his name repeatedly surfaced among those accused of covering up the actual death-toll and overall scale of violence. In 2003, Ziua newspaper reported that Ursu had authored an official account of the events in which he acknowledged that the miners had been transported to Bucharest with assistance from the authorities, that Chițac had ordered troops to offer the miners their full support and to open fire on demonstrators, and that as many as 1,200 protesters had been arrested. Official data authored by Ursu and Prosecutor-General Gheorghe Robu, released soon after the events, accounted for 185 people arrested.

Ursu lost his position after the Roman government was deposed by the new September 1991 Mineriad, but was appointed undersecretary of state at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the Theodor Stolojan cabinet, and later secretary of state, head of the Department for Local Public Administration. (replying on this issue, Roman argued that his cabinet had itself been targeted by the miners).

Ursu died on 14 April 2024, at the age of 71, and was buried in Bucharest's Ghencea Military Cemetery.