{{Short description|Romanian communist activist and politician}} {{Infobox officeholder | honorific_prefix = | name = Dumitru Coliu | birth_name = Dimităr Colev | native_name_lang = {{rou}} | honorific_suffix = | image = Dumitru Coliu.jpg | birth_date = November 7, 1907 | birth_place = Vasilieva, Dobrich Province, Principality of Bulgaria | death_date = 1985 | death_place = Bucharest, Socialist Republic of Romania | citizenship = Romanian | party = Romanian Communist Party | occupation = | profession = | awards = Order of Michael the Brave, 3rd class<br/>Order of the Star of the Romanian Socialist Republic, 2nd and 1st class }}
'''Dumitru Coliu''' (born '''Dimitar Kolev''', {{langx|ro|Dimităr Colev}}, {{langx|bg|Димитър Колев}}; November 7, 1907 – 1985) was a Romanian communist activist and politician.
An ethnic Bulgarian, he was born in Vasilieva village in Southern Dobruja, several years before it became part of Romania. Coliu entered a leather-workers’ union in 1923. In 1925, he joined the banned Romanian Communist Party (PCR). During the 1930s, he was active in the Dobrujan Revolutionary Organisation. He left for the Soviet Union in 1940,<ref name="dobre">Dobre ''et al.'', pp. 167-168</ref> spending the World War II years in Moscow with other Romanian communists,<ref name="crime"/> and was a devoted collaborator of Ana Pauker's.<ref name="tism175">Tismăneanu, p.175</ref> While there, he was a political officer in the Tudor Vladimirescu Division.<ref name="dobre"/>
Following the Coup of August 1944, he returned to Romania with the Horea, Cloșca și Crișan Division, and in August 1947 he was awarded the Order of Michael the Brave, 3rd class. In 1948 he was made a major-general in the Land Forces for political reasons.<ref name="crime"/><ref name="dobre"/> He joined the Central Committee of the PCR in 1945, remaining until 1979.<ref name="erdc">{{in lang|ro}} [http://www.edrc.ro/docs/docs/evreii/07_documente_228-256.pdf "Date în legãturã cu plecarea evreilor din R.P.R."], p. 645, at the Resource Center for Ethnocultural Diversity site</ref><ref name="dobre"/> Coliu was military attaché to the Soviet Union in 1949-1951.<ref name="dobre"/> He was elected a candidate member of the Politburo in 1952, alongside Alexandru Drăghici and Nicolae Ceaușescu,<ref>Tismăneanu, p.131</ref> holding that post until 1969. He sat in the Great National Assembly from 1948 to 1980, heading its foreign affairs committee from 1953 to 1955.<ref name="erdc"/><ref name="dobre"/>
Under Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej, between 1955 and 1965, he was president of the State Control Commission and of the Party Control Commission, seconded by Ion Vincze.<ref name="crime"/><ref>Tismăneanu, p.102</ref><ref name="dobre"/> The party's professional interrogator as part of repressive actions initiated by the Securitate secret police,<ref name="crime"/> he took over the latter post in 1960 as Constantin Pîrvulescu was purged for his silence several years earlier in a plot to unseat Gheorghiu-Dej.<ref name="tism170">Tismăneanu, p.170</ref> By 1961, the Comintern veteran was among those advocating a turn toward national communism.<ref name="tism175"/><ref name="tism170"/> He left his control commission post in 1969.<ref name="erdc"/> Coliu was a hardliner within the leadership of the PCR, an unconditional follower of Joseph Stalin and of Stalinism.<ref name="crime">{{in lang|ro}} [http://www.crimelecomunismului.ro/ro/biografiile_nomenklaturii/ Biografiile nomenklaturii] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120305073802/http://www.crimelecomunismului.ro/ro/biografiile_nomenklaturii/ |date=March 5, 2012 }}, at the Institute for the Investigation of Communist Crimes and the Memory of the Romanian Exile site; accessed May 22, 2012</ref>
His wife Olga was a Soviet citizen whom he married while in Moscow.<ref name="crime"/> His awards included the Order of the Star of the Romanian Socialist Republic, second class (1948) and first class (1957).<ref name="dobre"/>
==Notes== {{reflist}}
==References== *Florica Dobre, Liviu Marius Bejenaru, Clara Cosmineanu-Mareș, Monica Grigore, Alina Ilinca, Oana Ionel, Nicoleta Ionescu-Gură, Elisabeta Neagoe-Pleșa, Liviu Pleșa, ''Membrii C.C. al P.C.R. (1945–1989). Dicționar''. Bucharest: Editura Enciclopedică, 2004. {{ISBN|973-45-0486-X}} *Vladimir Tismăneanu, ''Stalinism for All Seasons: A Political History of Romanian Communism'', University of California Press, 2003, {{ISBN|0-52-023747-1}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Coliu, Dimitru}} Category:1907 births Category:1985 deaths Category:People from Dobrich Province Category:Romanian people of Bulgarian descent Category:Romanian Communist Party politicians Category:Romanian expatriates in the Soviet Union Category:Members of the Great National Assembly Category:Generals of the Army of the Socialist Republic of Romania Category:Tudor Vladimirescu Division personnel Category:Horea, Cloșca și Crișan Division personnel Category:Recipients of the Order of the Star of the Romanian Socialist Republic Category:Recipients of the Order of Michael the Brave Category:Military attachés