An answer probably lies in the special nature of Mr. Ceausescu's long rule.

Furthermore, Trotsky and his supporters harshly criticised the increasingly totalitarian nature of Joseph Stalin's rule.

But even as new posters of the general appear on walls all over the capital, Panamanians are continuing to debate the nature of his rule.

He makes a few passing negative comments on Nero's character in his work, but makes no remarks on the nature of his rule.

The very nature of Henry's rule was in itself defined by his parentage.

Ceauşescu's decision to immortalize his rule in stone, or rather concrete and imitation marble, made clear the anachronistic, even archaic nature of his rule.

The style of the building echoed the dual nature of Theodoric's rule.

In 1972, Mr. Kaunda had formally declared a one-party state, stirring worry about the increasingly authoritarian nature of his rule.

There is no disagreement about the nature of Saddam Hussein's rule: it is arbitrary, repressive, cruel in the extreme.

The unique position of the order and the nature of its rule has led to its being denied full status by historians, who have sometimes labelled it a mere confraternity.