 The Minister of Justice and prominent PCR member, Lucreţiu Pătrăşcanu, was conspicuously absent from the talks, in what was seen as an early sign of his downfall.In autumn 1946, Kavtaradze, who regularly instructed Pauker, played a part in the electoral fraud that brought the PCR-created Bloc of Democratic Parties to power under Groza's leadership ("see 1946 Romanian general election").In January 1947, as Romania prepared to sign the Paris Peace Treaty, he played a part in negotiating, with Premier Groza, Foreign Minister Tătărescu, and PCR activist Emil Bodnăraş, the Soviet takeover of islands on the Danube's Chilia branch.