A chilling Romanian exhibition replays videotaped secret police interrogations from 1989

BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — A new exhibition in Romania’s capital spotlights the harsh reality of interrogations carried out by the country’s notorious communist-era secret police.Held at the National History Museum of Romania in Bucharest, the exhibition is called “A.REST 1989.” The Securitate Video Archive uses video footage to reconstruct how detentions and interrogations worked under the Securitate, the sprawling network of spies that enforced Nicolae Ceausescu’s rule, until he was overthrown and executed in December 1989.The exhibition features original videotaped recordings of interrogations of four detainees investigated by the secret police, shown on grainy, wall-mounted monitors in the museum’s central hall. All were recorded in 1989 by the Criminal Investigations Directorate of the Securitate.In the middle of the exhibition space is a reconstructed cell furnished with a small bed, an empty metal bowl and cup, which evokes the isolation that detainees might have felt. It also hi