Ceausescu Says He Will Personally See to It That Anti-Semitic Articles Will No Longer Be Published

President Nicolai Ceausescu of Rumania has promised Chief Rabbi Moses Rosen that he will personally see to it that "such things do not happen again." Ceausescu, who met with Rosen for nearly one hour last Saturday, was referring to the publication of virulently anti-Semitic articles in a number of Communist Party papers and in a book of poetry.

Rosen, who arrived yesterday in Paris on his way to Casablanca where he will be guest of the Moroccan Jewish community and participate in the First National Conference of Moroccan Jewish Communities May 13 and 14, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that Ceausescu told him that as soon as he was informed of the anti-Semitic nature of some of the works in a book of poetry published a few months ago he personally ordered it seized and withdrawn from circulation.

ANTI-SEMITE POET REPRIMANDED

Rosen said the President also told him that the author, Comeliu Valerian Tudor was reprimanded "within the (Communist) Party framework as was the editor in charge of the book’s publication." The Chief Rabbi said his meeting with Ceausescu had been "very friendly" and that the President had shown full understanding of the situation.

Rosen said Ceausescu had not tried to deny the anti-Semitic nature of the attacks, as some of the lower echelon officials had done, and assured Rosen that from now on he will personally see to it that such incidents do not reoccur.

The Chief Rabbi told the JTA he regretted that the President had failed to promise adequate reparation for the harm done to the Jewish community by the slanderous attacks and that Valerian Tudor has not been publicly prosecuted as specified by the Rumaniar criminal code.

Rosen said that the chief army prosecutor, with whom he had filed criminal charges against Valerian Tudor, has not yet taken any measures against him. Under Rumanian law, it is the army judge advocate who deals with cases involving charges of fascist activities and racial crimes.

Rosen filed such charges against Valerian Tudor in March upon his return to Bucharest from a thre-month trip to Israel. He told the JTA at the time that he found most of Rumania’s 29,000 Jews scared, some actually panicky, about the anti-Semitic diatribes in the official press and the book of poetry.

OFFICIALS SAY IT WILL NOT OCCUR AGAIN

The book of poetry, which appeared last December and was widely distributed, contained material reminiscent of the worst war-time anti-Semitic literature. The material in the book said that Jews were "cursed" for being "thieves and corrupters, people with no conscience and no sense of loyalty, who have no patriotic links whatsoever to their country and only think of how to exploit it."

Since the JTA made known the Rumanian anti-Semitic campaign in March, several prominent Rumanian leaders, including First Deputy Prime Minister lon Dinca, Religious Affairs Minister lon Roseanu, and the Secretary of the Communist Party’s Central Committee, Petru Erale, met with Rosen to assure him that the publication of Valerian Tudor’s book had been an "accident" which will not occur again.

Rosen, who at one time thought of resigning from the Rumanian National Assembly in which he has been a member for the last 27 years, had called during all his meetings with the Rumanian officials for the authorities to launch public legal proceedings against those charged with anti-Semitic insults and incitement to racial hatred.