23 December 1989: Nicolae Ceaușescu’s overthrow follows a week of carnage in which thousands of protesters against his regime were killed in cold blood

President Nicolae Ceaușescu was overthrown yesterday and became a fugitive in the country he has ruled for 24 years as remnants of his personal troops fought bitter last battles with regular soldiers and demonstrators in the streets of the Romanian capital.

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Mystery surrounded the whereabouts of the former President and his wife, Elena, last night. Bucharest television said that they had left the country. Later reports suggested the couple had been captured. Their son, Nicu, was shown on television under arrest.

Witnesses saw scores of people shot down in the centre of Bucharest in the evening and around the burning royal palace where the Ceaușescu family had made their home.

Earlier, joyful crowds had paraded through the city after reports that Mr Ceaușescu had been arrested after trying to flee from the roof of the party headquarters by helicopter.

But their triumph was marred by the first confused reports of fresh bloodshed in the early evening following heavy machine-gun fire in Bucharest’s Republic Square. Soon afterwards, Bucharest television reported that Mr Ceaușescu and his wife were no longer in the country. It gave no further details.

Mr Ceaușescu’s overthrow followed a week of carnage in which thousands of men, women and children protesting against his regime were killed in cold blood, and probably tens of thousands wounded. Teams of doctors with emergency medical supplies were being flown in from Geneva last night.

In the early evening, it was announced that a National Democracy Committee had been formed, made up of uncompromised military commanders, students and intellectuals. The Ceaușescu administration’s Prime Minister, Mr Constantin Dăscălescu, and his government were said to have resigned.

The new committee declared its immediate aim was an end to the cult of personality which had developed around the Ceaușescu family. Free elections would be held as soon as possible, and independent media would be established. The notorious programme of razing villages in the countryside would be halted.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A photo of a television screen of Nicolae Ceaușescu delivering his last public speech from the balcony of the Romanian Communist Party headquarters, 21 December 1989. Photograph: Philippe Bouchon/AFP via Getty Images

The Soviet Parliament expressed its approval of the fall of President Ceaușescu and sent to the Romanian people a special message of support proposed by President Gorbachev. The message was apparently sent on the understanding that Mr Ceaușescu had been arrested.

The great Ceaușescu escape attempt came after it had become clear that most of the army had gone over to the people. The Defence Minister, General Vasile Milea, was said to have committed suicide – although it is equally possible he was shot by a member of the Ceaușescu retinue.

By 6 pm, Romanian television was broadcasting live reports of victory rallies attended by thousands in Bucharest. A voice in the studio said that the army was wholly on the side of the people. All strategic points in the country were said to be under the control of the people.

The streets and squares of Bucharest were littered with torn portraits and shattered busts of the President and his wife. The atmosphere was one of jubilation, and the over-riding feeling among the thousands celebrating in the city centre before the shooting began was one of undiluted triumph.

A caretaker government was announced within an hour of the dictator’s capture. Its provisional leader is the 73-year-old former Foreign Minister, Mr Corneliu Mănescu. He was a cosignatory of an open letter harshly critical of the Ceaușescu region which appeared last march.

One of the first acts of the new leadership was to place the security forces, the dreaded Securitate, under control of the army. One in four of the population is believed to have a member.

From the archive, 23 December 1989: Celebration as a nation emerges from the dark Read more

The day began as it ended with vehement anti-Ceaușescu demonstrations. Tens of thousands of people gathered in the early hours in front of the Intercontinental Hotel in Bucharest, undeterred by armoured vehicles. Machine guns splattered against a background of church bells ringing in triumph.

Ceaușescu’s hated son, Nicu, a one-time candidate to follow his father as the country’s leader, was said to have been arrested in the city of Sibiu as he was trying to take hostages.

This is an edited extract.

The fall of Ceaușescu: Radio station forms ‘heart of the nation’

23 December 1989

Bucharest’s Broadcasting House was the main source of information yesterday for Romanians about the country’s liberation and the means by which politicians, military officers and dissidents tried to influence the situation.

One announcer called it the ‘heart of our nation’. Its bulletins provide a dramatic account of the most important day in Romania‘s history since the Communist takeover in 1948.

Read the bulletins.