, former prisoner at
Auschwitz during a show trial conducted by communist authorities in Poland in 1948 Following some dissent within ruling
communist parties throughout the
Eastern Bloc, especially after the 1948
Tito–Stalin split, several party
purges occurred, with several hundred thousand members purged in several countries. In addition to rank-and-file member purges, prominent communists were purged, with some subjected to public show trials. Such high-ranking party show trials included those of
Koçi Xoxe in Albania and
Traicho Kostov in Bulgaria, who were purged and arrested. The higher-ranking the party member, generally the more harsh the torture that was inflicted upon him. In another case, the Hungarian
ÁVH secret police also condemned another party member as a Nazi accomplice with a document that had been previously displayed in a glass cabinet at the Institute of the Working Class Movement as an example of a
Gestapo forgery. During 1946–1949, several well-publicized show trials were held in the
People's Republic of Slovenia. First was the
Nagode Trial in which 32 non-communist intellectuals were tried as spies, three of them sentenced to death. Second was a series of so-called
Dachau trials in which 37 members of the Communist Party were sentenced, 15 of them to death. In the 1940s, highly publicized show trials were employed against many real or alleged collaborators, and people with pro-Bulgarian views, who were sentenced to death for national treason, in the
People's Republic of Macedonia.
Hungary Stalin's
NKVD emissary coordinated with Hungarian General Secretary
Mátyás Rákosi and his
ÁVH head the way the show trial of Hungarian Minister of Interior
László Rajk should go, and he was later executed.
Czechoslovakia The
Rajk trials in Hungary led Moscow to warn Czechoslovakia's parties that enemy agents had penetrated even high into party ranks, and when a puzzled
Rudolf Slánský and
Klement Gottwald inquired what they could do, Stalin's NKVD agents arrived to help prepare subsequent trials. First, these trials focused on people outside the
Czechoslovak Communist party. General
Heliodor Píka was arrested without a warrant in early May 1948 and accused of
espionage and
high treason, damaging the interests of the Czechoslovak Republic and the Soviet Union, and undermining the ability of the state to defend itself, Píka was not allowed to present a defence, and no witnesses were called. He was sentenced to death and hanged. During the
Prague Spring of 1968, Píka's case was reopened at the request of Milan Píka (son of Heliodor) and the elder Píka's lawyer, and a military tribunal declared Heliodor Píka innocent of all charges.
Milada Horáková, a
Czech politician focused on social issues and women's rights, who was jailed during the
German occupation for her political activity, was accused of leading a conspiracy to commit treason and espionage at the behest of the United States, Great Britain, France and Yugoslavia. Evidence of the alleged conspiracy included Horáková's presence at a meeting of political figures from the National Socialist,
Social Democrat and
People's parties, in September 1948, held to discuss their response to the new political situation in Czechoslovakia. She was also accused of maintaining contacts with Czechoslovak political figures in exile in the West. The trial of Horáková and twelve of her colleagues began on 31 May 1950 and the State's prosecutors were led by Dr.
Josef Urválek and included
Ludmila Brožová-Polednová. The trial proceedings were carefully orchestrated with confessions of guilt secured from the accused, though a recording of the event, discovered in 2005, revealed Horáková's defence of her political ideals. Horáková was sentenced to death, along with three co-defendants (Jan Buchal, Oldřich Pecl, and
Záviš Kalandra), on 8 June 1950. Many prominent figures in the West, notably
Albert Einstein,
Winston Churchill and
Eleanor Roosevelt, petitioned for her life, but the sentences were confirmed. She was executed by hanging in Prague's
Pankrác Prison on 27 June 1950. The trials then turned to the communist party itself (
Slánský trial). In November 1952
Rudolf Slánský and 13 other high-ranking Communist bureaucrats (Bedřich Geminder, Ludvík Frejka, Josef Frank,
Vladimír Clementis,
Bedřich Reicin, Karel Šváb,
Rudolf Margolius,
Otto Šling,
André Simone,
Artur London, Vavro Hajdů and Evžen Löbl), 10 of whom were Jews, were arrested and charged with being
Titoists and
Zionists, official
USSR rhetoric having turned against
Zionism. Party rhetoric asserted that Slánský was spying as part of an international western capitalist conspiracy to undermine socialism and that punishing him would avenge the Nazi murders of Czech communists
Jan Šverma and
Julius Fučík during World War II. The trial of the 14 national leaders began on 20 November 1952, in the Senate of the State Court, with the prosecutor being
Josef Urválek. It lasted eight days. It was notable for its strong
anti-Semitic overtones. All were found guilty, with three being sentenced to life imprisonment while the rest were sentenced to death. Slánský was hanged at
Pankrác Prison on 3 December 1952. His body was cremated and the ashes were scattered on an icy road outside of Prague. == Western Europe ==