ROMANIAN WRITER DESCRIBES FRENCH FOILING OF PLOT TO KILL HIM

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000606570003-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 27, 2010
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: September 1, 1982
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/08/27: CIA-RDP90-00552R000606570003-6
~'c~iliri~ or Plat to Dill iii
TFCer' D e sc no
By Paul Webster
Manchester Guardian
PARIS, Aug. 31-A dissident Romanian
writer, Virgil Tanase, who was believed to
have been murdered by Romanian agents,
emerged from three months in hiding today
to reveal details of an extraordinary secret
service operation mounted by the French.
Beside him at a press conference in Paris
was a small, bearded man identified only as
"Z," who said he had been ordered by Ro-
mania's secret police to kill Tanase. Around
the building where the conference was held,
armed French intelligence agents stood
guard.
The would-be assassin and intended vic-
tim said that President Francois Mitterrand
was kept informed throughout a fake kid-
naping scheme by the French secret service
to foi.. President Nicolae Ceausescu's revenge
on his critics abroad. Woven into several
months of intrigue leading to political asy-
lum for the hit man was a contrived diplo-
matic incident, a lethal fountain pen and a
medal for a murder that never was.
"President Mitterrand was aware of what
was going on since April," Tanase said. That
was two months before Mitterrand expressed
concern at the "tragic theory" of Tanase's
disappearance and called off a state visit to
Bucharest in protest.
Tanase immigrated to France in 1977 and
became a French citizen in 1979.
The Romanian Embassy in Paris today
issued an emphatic denial of Tanase's and
"Z's" account.
Like a good spy story, Tanase's adventure
started with a prologue=the fear among
Eastern Bloc refugees after the murder in
September 1978 of a Bulgarian dissident in
London with a poisoned umbrella. A Bulgar-
ian defector in Paris survived a similar at-
tack not long afterward.
1
Refugee writers, particularly those work-
ing for West European broadcasting stations
such as the British Broadcasting Corp. and
Radio Free Europe, lived in fear of other
sophisticated plots.
After the death under suspicious circum-
stances of another Bulgarian dissident
broadcaster in London, secret service agents
throughout Europe stepped up their interest
in men linked to Eastern Europe's secret
police.
This explains why the French counter-in-
telligence service, the DST, was so receptive
when a Romanian agent-"Z"--turned up at
their Paris headquarters early last spring
and asked for political asylum for himself
and his family. In exchange, he gave details
of his mission in France-to murder writers
Paul Goma and Virgil Tanase.
Goma had angered the Romanian presi-
dent with a series of books including "Dogs
of Death" that described Romanian concen-
tration camps. Tanase had written a mock-
ing account of Ceausescu, whom he de-
scribed as communism's first king.
The first target was to be Goma, "Z" told
the DST. The agent also said that he was
carrying a fountain pen containing a color-
less poison that would kill in a few seconds.
As Goma had a weak heart, it was presumed
that his death would be seen as natural.
"Z" carried out the murder attempt as
planned at a cocktail party with the coop-'.
eration of the DST. He dropped the poison
in Goma's wineglass, but before the writer
could drink it a clumsy guest knocked over
the glass. The guest was a DST agent work-
ing with "Z."
It was presumed that "Z" was being
watched by his oN%m side, which would report
that the attempt had failed by accident. This
gave the DST breathing space to think up
ways of foiling the murder plot against
Tanase.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/08/27: CIA-RDP90-00552R000606570003-6