Nuritdin Akramovich Mukhitdinov
Nuritdin Akramovich Muhitdinov
1917–2008
↓ Resigned central post 1961
First Central Asian in the Presidium, nationalities-policy practitioner
At the First Congress of the Uzbek Intelligentsia in Tashkent in October 1956, he became the first Soviet leader to publicly name victims of Stalin-era mass repression — before Khrushchev's 'Secret Speech' had been made public.
Born to an Uzbek peasant family, he graduated from the All-Union Cooperative Institute by correspondence and served as a political and radio-intelligence officer in the Red Army, fighting at Stalingrad. After the war he rose fast through the Uzbek party, becoming First Secretary of the Uzbek CP in 1955 and, from 1957, the first Central Asian full member of the CPSU Presidium and a CC Secretary. During the Khrushchev Thaw he drove mass political rehabilitation in Uzbekistan, the return of deported peoples, and the founding of the Tashkent Nuclear Physics Institute. After policy disagreements with Khrushchev he left central work in 1961, later served as ambassador to Syria, and died at 90.
Career Timeline
- 1939–1946Red Army, political and radio-intelligence work
- 1948–1950First Secretary, Namangan Oblast Party Committee
- 1951–1953Chairman, Council of Ministers of the Uzbek SSR
- 1954–1955Chairman, Council of Ministers of the Uzbek SSR (restored)
- 1955–1957First Secretary, CC of the CP of Uzbekistan
- 1957–1961CC Secretary and Presidium member, CPSU
- 1968–1977Soviet Ambassador to Syria
- 1986–2008Chairman, Society for Protection of Monuments of Uzbekistan
Related historical events
The Uzbek Thaw: Mass Rehabilitation and the Return of Deported Peoples
The year 1956, when Mukhitdinov served as First Secretary of the Uzbek CP, saw the Thaw unfold most dramatically in Central Asia. That year alone, around 40,000 victims of unjust repression were officially rehabilitated in Uzbekistan. At the First Congress of the Uzbek Intelligentsia held in Tashkent on 10–14 October 1956, Mukhitdinov became the first Soviet leader anywhere to publicly disclose the scale of Stalin-era mass repression and to name its victims, at a time when Khrushchev's 'Secret Speech' had not yet been made public. Together with writers and poets who had returned from the camps, the congress debated previously forbidden topics: the colonial character of the 19th-century conquest of Central Asia, inter-ethnic conflicts, and suppressed cultural heritage. On Mukhitdinov's initiative, in autumn 1956 the CPSU Presidium resolved to allow the return of the Caucasian peoples (Balkars, Karachais, Ingush, Chechens) who had been forcibly deported to Central Asia in 1943–44; mass repatriation followed in 1957. The founding of the Tashkent Nuclear Physics Institute and the revival of the Uzbek Academy of Sciences were also driven by Mukhitdinov during this same period.