Noël Bernard (born Noel Bercovici; 25 February 1925 – 23 December 1981) was a Romanian journalist, known for being the head of the

Romanian-language Romanian (obsolete spelling: Roumanian; , or , ) is the official and main language of Romania and Moldova. Romanian is part of the Eastern Romance languages, Eastern Romance sub-branch of Romance languages, a linguistic group that evolved fr ...

department of

Radio Free Europe Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a media organization broadcasting news and analyses in 27 languages to 23 countries across Eastern Europe, Central Asia, the Caucasus, and the Middle East. Headquartered in Prague since 1995, RFE/RL ...

(RFE). His mysterious death is believed by some to have been caused by

Communist Romania The Socialist Republic of Romania (, RSR) was a Marxism–Leninism, Marxist–Leninist One-party state, one-party socialist state that existed officially in Romania from 1947 to 1989 (see Revolutions of 1989). From 1947 to 1965, the state was ...

's secret police, the

Securitate The Department of State Security (), commonly known as the Securitate (, ), was the secret police agency of the Socialist Republic of Romania. It was founded on 30 August 1948 from the '' Siguranța'' with help and direction from the Soviet MG ...

, which is known to have previously sought to "neutralise" him.

Biography

Born in Bucharest, to a

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

father, Filip Bercovici, and a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

Catholic mother, Elisabeth née Jahn, Noël Bernard left Romania together with his parents and moved to

Mandatory Palestine Mandatory Palestine was a British Empire, British geopolitical entity that existed between 1920 and 1948 in the Palestine (region), region of Palestine, and after 1922, under the terms of the League of Nations's Mandate for Palestine. After ...

in 1940. There he studied mathematics at the

Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; ) is an Israeli public university, public research university based in Jerusalem. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Chaim Weizmann in July 1918, the public university officially opened on 1 April 1925. ...

where he met his first wife, fellow student Yvette Bourla. He then moved to London, where he changed his surname to Bernard and became a journalist at the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

, working in the organisation's Romanian service. Bernard started working as the chief of the Romanian language department of the

West German West Germany was the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from its formation on 23 May 1949 until its reunification with East Germany on 3 October 1990. It is sometimes known as the Bonn Republic after its capital c ...

-based

in 1953, but he left in 1958 and moved to Rome with his wife and two children. After reporting from Rome, he and his family returned to England, where Bernard ran the London office of Radio Press International (RPI), a radio news service that was ultimately bought out by

UPI United Press International (UPI) is an American international news agency whose newswires, photo, news film, and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations for most of the 20th ce ...

. Eight years after leaving Munich, Bernard returned to serve as director of RFE's Romanian-language department until his death in 1981.Nestor Ratesh
"In memoriam: Noël Bernard"
''

Revista 22 ''Revista 22'' (''22 Magazine'') is a Romanian weekly magazine, issued by the Group for Social Dialogue and focused mainly on politics and culture. History and profile ''Revista 22'' was started in 1990. The first edition of the magazine was prin ...

'', 4 March 2005 In 1972, he married Ioana Măgură. A former newsreader for the Romanian Radio and

Television Television (TV) is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. Additionally, the term can refer to a physical television set rather than the medium of transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, ...

(1964–1969), she had

defected In politics, a defector is a person who gives up allegiance to one state in exchange for allegiance to another, changing sides in a way which is considered illegitimate by the first state. More broadly, defection involves abandoning a person, ca ...

from Communist Romania in 1969, and had started working for RFE in Munich. Under his leadership, the Romanian-language department of Radio Free Europe became the most popular of all the language-specific departments of RFE. After the

1977 Bucharest earthquake The 1977 Vrancea earthquake occurred on 4 March 1977, at 21:22 local time, and was felt throughout the Balkans. It had a Moment magnitude scale, magnitude of 7.5, making it the second most powerful earthquake recorded in Socialist Republic of Ro ...

, Bernard obtained permission from the radio board to transmit around-the-clock information in Romanian. According to Arch Puddington in ''Broadcasting Freedom. The Cold War Triumph of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty'', under Bernard's leadership "the Romanian section carried out a relentless polemical offensive against Ceaușescu ..The tone was biting, personal and sarcastic. During Bernard's editorship, the Romanian section was not infrequently cited for violation of the station's strictures against vituperation and rhetorical excess." The

tried to start disputes within the Romanian-language department of RFE and to create a hostile environment against Bernard, to remove him from the head of the radio station.

Ion Mihai Pacepa Ion Mihai Pacepa (; 28 October 1928 – 14 February 2021) was a Romanian lieutenant general in the Securitate, the secret police of the Socialist Republic of Romania, who defected to the United States in July 1978 following President Jimmy Carte ...

, the Romanian intelligence general who defected to the United States, claimed that he decided to defect after Communist President

Nicolae Ceaușescu Nicolae Ceaușescu ( ; ; – 25 December 1989) was a Romanian politician who was the second and last Communism, communist leader of Socialist Romania, Romania, serving as the general secretary of the Romanian Communist Party from 1965 u ...

ordered him to assassinate Bernard. In his book, '' Red Horizons'', Pacepa claimed that Bernard was Ceaușescu's '' bête noire'' because of his strong criticism of Ceaușescu's personality cult. Bernard died of cancer. His wife, Ioana Măgură-Bernard, moved to California, to join her daughter and grandchildren. In various statements for the Romanian press, she suggests that her late husband was

irradiated Irradiation is the process by which an object is exposed to radiation. An irradiator is a device used to expose an object to radiation, most often gamma radiation, for a variety of purposes. Irradiators may be used for sterilizing medical and p ...

by the

, which had previously infiltrated the RFE's structure. She also linked Bernard's death to those of RFE journalists such as

Cornel Chiriac Cornel Chiriac (May 8, 1941 March 4, 1975) was a Romanian journalist, radio producer, record producer and jazz drummer. Early life Chiriac was born on May 8, 1941, in , a village in Bessarabia, Soviet Union (previously in Cetatea Albă County, Kin ...

(who was stabbed to death in mysterious circumstances), Emil Georgescu and

Vlad Georgescu Vlad Georgescu (October 20, 1937 – November 13, 1988) was a Romanian historian, academic, political dissident, and director of the Romanian-language department of Radio Free Europe between 1983 and 1988. Biography Born in Bucharest, Georgescu st ...

(both of whom, like Bernard and others in quick succession, died of cancer). This hypothesis appears to be supported by his Securitate file, which has attached an article from a magazine which talks about him undergoing surgery and has a note which argues that the article confirms "the measures undertaken by us are starting to have an effect". (See also:

Radu (weapon) Radu was, according to Ion Mihai Pacepa, a radiological weapon used against dissenters and critics by Nicolae Ceaușescu's Securitate. "Radu" is a Romanian name for boys and, in this context, it is a reference to "radiation". The supposed weap ...

Biography

References

Further reading