Vatsek, Ivan Prokofevich

Born Dec. 16 (28), 1870, in Vienna; died Mar. 27, 1951, in Tbilisi. Soviet Party and state figure. Member of the Communist Party from 1903. Born into the family of a worker; of Czech origin.

Vatsek’s family moved to Russia in 1876. He worked as a mechanic. In 1903, Vatsek was the leader of the July general strike of the Baku workers. In 1905-12 he was chairman of the Bibi-Eibat regional committee and a member of the Baku committee of the RSDLP. In the summer of 1917 he was chairman of the Chernogorsk regional committee and a member of the Baku soviet and the Baku Party committee. After the fall of Soviet power in Baku he worked in the Astrakhan Province cheka. After October 1920, Vatsek was a member of the Central Committee and chairman of the Central Control Commission of the Azerbaijan Communist Party (Bolshevik) and then secretary of the Party collegium of the Party Control Commission of the Central Committee of the ACP (Bolshevik) for Transcaucasia and a member of the Audit Commission of the Georgian Communist Party (Bolshevik). He was a deputy to the first, second, and third convocations of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. He was awarded the Order of Lenin and various medals.