100 Death Sentences

Under the guns of the Red Army, Bulgarian justice moved swiftly. In Sofia the trials of the war criminals ended with a bang--of rifles. Hardly had the "People's Courts" pronounced sentence on the "enemies of the people" for "dragging" Bulgaria into war than the firing squads lined up. In the jampacked square before Sofia's Palace of Justice a crowd of 150,000 wildly cheered the news that the 100 death sentences were "without appeal," would be carried out "immediately." The condemned had just time to make brief preparation for eternity before they were sent there. The parade to the execution wall included:

P: Three former Regents: Prince Cyril, brother of the late Tsar Boris III and uncle of the boy King Simeon II; ex-Premier Professor Bogdan Filoff, Bulgarian expansionist, who preferred making history to teaching it; Lieut. General Nikola Mikhoff, who had held the mistaken belief that the German Army was invincible.

P:| Two ex-Premiers: stodgy, Naziphile Dobri Boshiloff; vacillating Ivan Bagrianoff, who took Bulgaria out of the war last August, sent armistice delegates to Egypt only to have Russia declare war on his country before peace could be made with Britain and the U.S.

P: Twenty-two Ministers, nine Royal Counselors, 66 ex-Deputies of the Bulgarian Sobranye (Parliament).

To jail for life, with confiscation of property and a fine of 3,000,000 leva ($36,000 at prewar rates), went Bulgaria's last war Premier, Konstantin Muravieff, Agrarian and liberal, who landed Bulgaria in a three-day war with Russia while trying to remain neutral. Forty-nine Deputies received jail terms.

Rumania's Installment. Rumania also prepared its "People's Courts" and firing squads. From a list of 2,000 "war criminals," the Rumanian Government selected a first installment of 100 generals, politicians _ and officials to be tried this week. Heading the list was Rumania's former Dictator and Premier, Marshal Ion Antonescu. When Russia strong-armed Bessarabia and northern Bukovina from Rumania, ten months after the Moscow-Berlin pact (1939), Marshal Antonescu eagerly clasped Hitler's eagerly proffered hand, was unable to unclasp it in time.

Also included were foppish, swaggering Vice Premier Mihai Antonescu (no kin), who was as bitterly anti-Russian as his namesake; General Konstantin Voiculescu, ex-Governor of Bessarabia, who was given to hanging rebellious peasants or drowning them in their wells.

Ethiopia's List. Last week came word that Ethiopia's Emperor Haile Selassie, who likes to keep abreast of European developments, had also submitted (to Britain) a list of war criminals he wants returned to Ethiopia for trial. Among them: Benito Mussolini, Marshal Pietro Badoglio.

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