Roman Andreyevich Rudenko (, ; – 23 January 1981) was a

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

lawyer A lawyer is a person who is qualified to offer advice about the law, draft legal documents, or represent individuals in legal matters. The exact nature of a lawyer's work varies depending on the legal jurisdiction and the legal system, as w ...

and statesman. Procurator-General of the

Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, abbreviated as the Ukrainian SSR, UkrSSR, and also known as Soviet Ukraine or just Ukraine, was one of the Republics of the Soviet Union, constituent republics of the Soviet Union from 1922 until 1991. ...

from 1944 to 1953, Rudenko became Procurator-General of the entire

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

after 1953. He is well known internationally for acting as chief prosecutor for the USSR at the 1946 trial of the major

Nazi war criminals The following is a list of people who were formally indicted for committing war crimes or crimes against humanity on behalf of the Axis powers during World War II, including those who were acquitted or never received judgement. It does not inc ...

Nuremberg Nuremberg (, ; ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the Franconia#Towns and cities, largest city in Franconia, the List of cities in Bavaria by population, second-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Bav ...

. He was also chief prosecutor at the " Trial of the Sixteen" (Polish Underground leaders) held in Moscow the year before. At the time he served at Nuremberg, Rudenko held the rank of Lieutenant-General within the USSR Procuracy. In 1961 Rudenko was elected to the CPSU Central Committee. In 1972 he was awarded the Soviet honorary title of

Hero of Socialist Labour The Hero of Socialist Labour () was an Title of honor, honorific title in the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact countries from 1938 to 1991. It represented the highest degree of distinction in the USSR and was awarded for exceptional achievem ...

Ukrainian SSR to 1953

Rudenko was one of the chief commandants of NKVD special camp Nr. 7, a former Nazi concentration camp, until its closure in 1950. Of the 60,000 prisoners incarcerated there under his supervision, at least 12,000 died due to malnutrition and disease. In October 1951, as Procurator-General of the Ukrainian SSR, he personally led prosecution in the trial of OUN member Mykhailo Stakhur who in October 1949 killed the writer

Yaroslav Halan Yaroslav Oleksandrovych Halan (, party nickname ''Comrade Yaga''; 27 July 1902 – 24 October 1949) was a Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, Soviet Ukrainian writer, playwright, and publicist. A member of the Communist Party of Western Ukra ...

Soviet Union 1953–1981

After the arrest of

Lavrentiy Beria Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria ka, ლავრენტი პავლეს ძე ბერია} ''Lavrenti Pavles dze Beria'' ( – 23 December 1953) was a Soviet politician and one of the longest-serving and most influential of Joseph ...

in 1953, Rudenko was a judge at the closed trial at which Stalin's last secret police chief was sentenced to death. In 1960, he acted as the chief prosecutor in U-2 pilot

Francis Gary Powers Francis Gary Powers (August 17, 1929August 1, 1977) was an American pilot who served as a United States Air Force officer and a CIA employee. Powers is best known for his involvement in the 1960 U-2 incident, when he was shot down while fly ...

espionage Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering, as a subfield of the intelligence field, is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information ( intelligence). A person who commits espionage on a mission-specific contract is called an ...

trial. As Procurator General of the Soviet Union, Rudenko played a major role in devising measures to deal with the growing dissident movement within the USSR. RUSMARKA-1949

In 1967, he and then KGB chairman

Vladimir Semichastny Vladimir Yefimovich Semichastny (; ; 15 January 1924 – 12 January 2001) was a Soviet politician, who served as Chairman of the KGB from November 1961 to May 1967. A protégé of Alexander Shelepin, he rose through the ranks of the Communist ...

submitted proposals as to how to deal with those defending the writers

Yuli Daniel Yuli Markovich Daniel ( rus, Ю́лий Ма́ркович Даниэ́ль, p=ˈjʉlʲɪj ˈmarkəvʲɪtɕ dənʲɪˈelʲ, a=Yuliy Markovich Daniel'.ru.vorb.oga; 15 November 1925 – 30 December 1988) was a Russian writer and Soviet disside ...

and

Andrei Sinyavsky Andrei Donatovich Sinyavsky (; 8 October 1925 – 25 February 1997) was a Russian writer and Soviet dissident known as a defendant in the Sinyavsky–Daniel trial of 1965. Sinyavsky was a literary critic for ''Novy Mir'' and wrote works critic ...

during and after their trial, without provoking a strong reaction abroad or within the country. This included mention of the "mental illness" suffered by several prominent dissidents. One measure, proposed jointly with

Yuri Andropov Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov ( – 9 February 1984) was a Soviet politician who served as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from late 1982 until his death in 1984. He previously served as the List of Chairmen of t ...

in late 1972, was to reduce the number of arrests and convictions by reinforcing the issue of "prophylactic" warnings to individuals, cautioning them that their activities could lead to prosecution under Articles 70 and 190¹ of the RSFSR Criminal Code.Joint KGB-Procurator-General's Memorandum to Central Committee, 16 November 1972 (Pb 67/XVI), Bukovsky Archive online

References

Ukrainian SSR to 1953

Soviet Union 1953–1981

References

Further reading