ROMANIA-HISTORY-HERITAGE-PRISON

A prison cell where Monsignor Vladimir Ghika, a romanian catholic priest beatified by Pope Francisc, lived his final days as detainee at Jilava prison February 14, 2024. Pitesti is one of 44 prisons and 72 forced labour camps set up under Romania's former Communist regime (1945-1989) to incarcerate more than 150,000 political prisoners, according to the country's Institute for the Investigation of Communist Crimes. While some of these facilities still house prisoners, many of the now-derelict buildings have been shut down or demolished, with companies having converted a few into offices. Only two former Communist prisons in Romania have so far been converted into museums with the help of private funds. One of them is the site of the former Pitesti prison about a two-hour drive from Bucharest, which is on the list of proposed UNESCO sites.  (Photo by Daniel MIHAILESCU / AFP) (Photo by DANIEL MIHAILESCU/AFP via Getty Images)