Kemál Ekrem

From the Hungarian Wikipedia page [1]

Ekrem Kemal (Skopje, October 20, 1924 - Budapest, November 29, 1957) was a prominent member of the Széna Square Revolutionary Group who was sentenced to death and executed during the 1956 Revolution. He was the father of the Hungarian politician György Ekrem-Kemal.

Kemal Ekrem was born on October 20, 1924, Skopje, Yugoslavia (today the capital of Macedonia). His father, Ekrem Halil, was a Turkish capitalist, and his mother was Erzhebet Ecker, a smallholder in Csongrád. After his father was assassinated by Serbian separatists, his mother returned to Hungary with Ekrem Kemali. First they lived in Budapest, and his middle school was Ekrem Eger Minorite. In St. Antal's Boy's Institute. He then completed technical training at Puskás Tivadar Technik to become an electrical engineer-technician. In the 1950s he worked as a supervisor for the construction of a high-voltage network in Northern Hungary. In 1956, 2 years were imprisoned for 2 years 8 months in prison for sabotage at work, but he did not start his sentence because of the outbreak of the revolution.

From the Russian Wikipedia page [2]

Kemal Ekrem (Hungarian Ekrem Kemál; October 20, 1924, Skopje - November 29, 1957, Budapest) - Hungarian electrician of Turkish-Magyar origin, an active participant in the anti-communist Hungarian uprising of 1956. He was one of the rebel commanders in the days of the Budapest battles. Executed after the suppression of the uprising.

Kemal Ekrem's biography is replete with conflicting information. He was born in Macedonia, spoke Serbian since childhood. Baker Khalik Ekrem, father of Kemal Ekrem, came from among Turkish landowners. The peasant woman Erzhebet Ekrem, Kemal's mother, was an ethnic Hungarian . Khalik Ekrem died under unclear circumstances (according to various sources, either committed suicide, or was killed by Serbian nationalists). Erzhebet Ekrem left the family. Some sources claim that she moved to Malta , where she was a singer, then a seamstress. Kemal was raised by a grandmother from four years old.

In 1935, Kemal Ekrem came from Yugoslavia to Hungary, where he reunited with his mother. In 1939 he traveled to Italy, visited Rome and Palermo.

In Hungary, Kemal Ekrem mastered the profession of mechanics, worked at the plant of Ganz. In 1944, he was persecuted on a national basis by the Salashists, was evicted from Budapest.

After the Hungarian Communist Party came to power, Kemal Ekrem worked as an electrician in Budapest. I did not register Hungarian citizenship in order not to serve in the army of the People's Republic of Hungary . He was considered politically unreliable, was under the supervision of state security. However, he filed an application to the GTR and for a short time was in the party - until the audit was carried out, according to the results of which Ekrem was excluded. After that, in 1949, he was evicted from Budapest and temporarily interned.

From 1952 he worked on the construction of a power plant, then at a mine near Pec. He had a good professional reputation, received a relatively high salary. However, in May 1956, Kemal Ekrem was charged under the criminal article for possession of stolen property. The court sentenced him to 2 years and 8 months in prison.

The data on the participation of Kemal Ekrem in the anti-communist Hungarian uprising are also contradictory. Most sources agree that on October 23, 1956, Ekrem was in prison and was released the next day. But there is an opinion that initially he went to the District Military Committee of the HVAC to support the regime of Gerö - Hegedush. However, the apparatchiks did not accept the support of “cleaned out of the party”, and then Ekrem joined the rebels.

According to other sources, as early as October 24, 1956, Kemal Ekrem joined the rebels in Seine Square. Along with József Dudás, János Szabó, and Róbert Bán, he became one of the leaders of the rebel defense in the II district of Budapest. Took extremely radical positions in the spirit of Dudas.

On November 4, the defense of the Seine and Moscow squares was broken by Soviet tanks. Kemal Ekrem tried to establish radio contact with Belaya Kira and coordinate the continuation of the armed struggle. He was badly wounded in a street shootout, spent a week almost unconscious, then moved on crutches. He spent almost two months hiding underground.

December 28, 1956 Kemal Ekrem was arrested. The internal affairs agencies of the People's Republic of Hungary faced a legal conflict: it turned out that Ekrem had not been issued with Hungarian citizenship. A request was sent to Belgrade, from where they also reported that Ekrem was not a citizen of Yugoslavia . The process over it was conducted "without prior arrangement".

Like Dudas and Szabo, he was sentenced to death in advance as one of the most radical leaders of the uprising. The death sentence on Kemal Ekrem was issued on July 29, 1957 and carried out exactly four months later.

After the dismantling of the communist regime in Hungary, Kemal Ekrem is considered one of the heroes of the 1956 uprising. He is especially popular among the Hungarian far right.

The son of Kemal Ekrem - György Ekrem-Kemal was a prominent figure in the association of veterans of the uprising and one of the founders of the ultra-right Hungarist movement, which in modern Hungary is considered the heir of the ideas of Salashism.

## See also

* Laszlo Rusnyak
* Andras Laurinets
* Tibor Czimer
* Gergely Pongrátz
* László Iván Kovács