Nicolae Ceaușescu was a Romanian politician and dictator who was the second and last communist leader of Romania, serving as the general secretary of the Romanian Communist Party from 1965 until his execution in 1989. He was the country's head of state from 1967 to 1989, serving as President of the State Council from 1967 and as the first president from 1974. Ceaușescu was overthrown and executed in the Romanian Revolution on 25 December 1989 along with his wife Elena Ceaușescu, as part of a series of anti-communist uprisings in Eastern Europe that year.