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HomeNew Investigation into Wallenberg's Fate Prompted by Birstein/Berger DiscoveryA new investigation has been launched into the fate of Raoul Wallenberg due to the discovery by Vadim Birstien and Susanne Berger that the Swedish Foreign Office was well aware that a 1991 Soviet-sanctioned investigation into Wallenberg's death was stopped by direct order of the KGB after Dr. Birstein discovered three important documents in the Soviet archives. Read about it here:
Washington Post Haaretz Daily News BBC News PRESS RELEASE, January 16, 2012See Washington Post article discussing this issue.
Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg was arrested by Soviet forces in Hungary 67 years ago, on January 17, 1945. Wallenberg, who had been instrumental in protecting thousands of Jews in Budapest, subsequently disappeared in the Soviet Union and the full circumstances of his fate remain yet to be determined. The KGB Acted To Stop the Investigation Into Raoul Wallenberg's Fate in 1991 Censorship Of Key Records Continued After the End Of The Soviet Union And Continues Today When Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev invited Wallenberg's family to Moscow in October 1989, hopes were high that this gesture would signal a new openness in the case. There seemed reason for optimism: In 1990/91, 'The International Commission to Establish Raoul Wallenberg's Fate', headed by Wallenberg's brother, Dr. Guy von Dardel, was allowed unprecedented access to foreign prisoner files and Soviet era prison records. Russian officials also began to release previously unknown documents from a variety of archives. However, a newly released memorandum from the Swedish Foreign Ministry Archive confirms long standing claims that KGB officials acted as early as the Spring of 1991 to stop a review by investigators working for the first International Wallenberg Commission. According to the records, Russian archivist Anatoly Prokopenko informed the Swedish Embassy, Moscow in September 1991 that KGB officials earlier that year had placed a phone call instructing him to stop two independent researchers of the human rights organization "Memorial" from studying documentation directly related to the Raoul Wallenberg case. The researchers in question were Arseny Roginsky, co-founder and current President of Russia's "Memorial" Society, and Dr. Vadim Birstein, a historian and molecular geneticist. At that time Mr. Prokopenko headed the so-called "Special Archive" (now the Russian State Military Archive) in which important document collections related to prisoners of war, including foreign diplomats, are kept. According to notations on the 1991 memo, Guy von Dardel was immediately notified about Prokopenko's statements. (The document could not be located in the collection of his personal papers, however.) Mr. Prokopenko reported that KGB representatives had asked him to provide copies of every piece of paper Birstein and Roginsky had reviewed, especially after they had discovered previously unknown documents about Raoul Wallenberg. This discovery had received wide publicity in the Russian media and Prokopienko explicity stated his respect for the research that had produced the new findings. It was Prokopenko's impression that the KGB had not inspected the materials held at the Special Archive prior to Birstein and Roginsky's research and that the agency worried more sensitive information would surface. Mr. Prokopenko further pointed out to Swedish officials that the major archival collection Birstein and Roginsky had been studying, the so-called "Fond Nr. 451 of the Political Department of the NKVD/MVD Main Directorate for POWs and Interned Persons (GUPVI)" contained important files regarding the Wallenberg case. Most importantly, it held - and still holds - operative correspondence files between the Soviet MVD prison authorities, the Soviet security services and the Soviet leadership. Mr. Prokopenko first publicly revealed the fact that he had been pressured by KGB officials to end Birstein and Roginsky's work in Fond 451 in the Russian newspaper Trud in 1997. In 1991, shortly before the end of the Soviet Union in December of that year, preparations began for a joint Swedish-Russian Working Group to continue the investigation begun by the International Commission on Raoul Wallenberg's Fate. Hopes were especially high during the short tenure of former Soviet Minister of the Interior, Vadim Bakatin, as Chief of the KGB from August - December 1991. Both the research work and release of documentation intensified, but the wave of openness soon receded. Swedish officials agreed to the appointment of Vladimir Galitsky, a professional military archivist, to review Fond 451, part time, during a one year period. Researchers working with the Swedish side of the Working Group repeatedly raised concerns that a single person alone could not possibly conduct an effective search of the vast holdings of this archival collection. In 1997, the then U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan in a "Note Verbale" petitioned Russian officials to allow full and unhindered access to Fond 451 for foreign researchers. Russian officials declined, stating that the review conducted by Mr. Galitsky had been sufficient. The Working Group was granted permission to study a series of personal files for individuals closely connected to the Wallenberg case, including many not previously available to Birstein and Roginsky. This review also included some selective access to classified documentation. However, the requests to study critically important investigation materials for these prisoners was repeatedly denied. Nevertheless, like its predecessor, the Swedish-Russian Working Group was able to carry out some truly pioneering work such as photographing and analyzing thousands of prisoner cards at Vladimir prison, the Soviet Union's most important isolator facility. Still, researchers continued to struggle to verify results and to gain proper access to necessary collections. In 2009, we also learned that KGB officials had withheld key information from Swedish investigators from the start. It appears that in 1991, while releasing records about interrogations in Moscow's Lubyanka Prison, the KGB archivists concealed the fact that Raoul Wallenberg had been held as "Prisoner Nr. 7", and that he was interrogated on July 23, 1947. This was six days after July 17, 1947, the day Russian officials have claimed for decades as Wallenberg's official death date. KGB representatives had repeatedly assured Swedish officials that Wallenberg had never been held as a numbered prisoner. Censoring these vital pieces of information essentially prevented the Swedish side from taking proper steps to pursue important leads in Russian archives at the time. Lt. Gen. Vasily Khristoforov, the current Head of the FSB (successor to the KGB) Registration and Archival Collections Directorate, maintains that his collections contain no further information about Raoul Wallenberg's fate after July 1947. Anatoly Prokopenko, on the other hand, has repeatedly stressed his belief that Raoul Wallenberg's personal file was not fully destroyed and that a similar file or a part of it survives for Wallenberg's Hungarian driver, Vilmos Langfelder. This assertion is lent credibility by the fact that last year Mr. Khristoforov admitted that a large portion of the file of Raoul Wallenberg's long-time cellmate in Soviet captivity, Willy Roedel, remains preserved in the FSB archive. It is clear that other important materials of great relevance to the Wallenberg case continue to exist in Russian archives, but have not been made available so far. The following actions are needed. - Complete, uncensored access to the Lubyanka Prison interrogation registers must be granted, including the interrogation on July 23, 1947, and to related documentation. - Investigation materials concerning prisoners closely connected to the Raoul Wallenberg case should be made available. - Internal correspondence records of the MGB/KGB/MID for the years 1947-1965, concerning specific issues outlined in previous research reports, need to be reviewed. - Statistical information about Swedish nationals held in Soviet captivity since the end of World War II should be provided. The statistics of Swedish citizens held in various Soviet era prisons and labor camps for specific years are essential for determining if Raoul Wallenberg was held as a secret prisoner in the Soviet Union after July 1947. - Soviet foreign and military intelligence reports from Hungary for 1944-45 need to be made accessible. They might reveal vital information about Wallenberg's activities in Hungary and, possibly, shed some light on how Soviet officials chose to handle his case. - It remains unknown from what archival file(s) the so-called Smoltsov report that claimed that Raoul Wallenberg had died of a heart attack in Lubyanka Prison on July 17, 1947 originated. This information is crucial for the case. - Documentation about the background discussions by Soviet leaders of the key document in the Wallenberg case, the so-called Gromyko memorandum from 1957, need to be furnished. January 16, 2012 Susanne Berger Vadim Birstein The FSB Should Open Up the Wallenberg FilesClick here to read the article by Vadim Birstein and Susanne Berger calling for the opening up of the Russian archives concerning Wallenberg, published by The Moscow Times on October 11, 2011.Russian official acknowledges Soviet version of Wallenberg's death could be fabricationClick here to read the Associated Press's interview on September 25, 2011 with Lt. Gen. Vasily Khristoforov, who admits the Soviets may have "helped" Wallenberg die.Click here to read Dr. Birstein's and Susanna Berger's response to the interview!Surprised Again - New Documentation about Raoul Wallenberg's Cellmate Surfaces(click here to read about last year's discovery that Raoul Wallenberg was still alive after the date of his death alleged by the Soviet/Russian Authorities)International press about the new Raoul Wallenberg documentation:
Willy Rödel (photo: Guy von Dardel, Private archive; courtesy of Dieter Rödel)
The recent publication of two statements written for Soviet interrogators by Willy Rödel, Raoul Wallenberg's cellmate in Soviet captivity, are the clearest sign yet that Russian archives still contain critically important documents in the Wallenberg case. * Russian authorities are believed to have intentionally withheld at least fifity-seven pages from Rödel's file * The missing documentation most likely contains important information about Raoul Wallenberg Since the beginning of the Swedish-Russian Working Group in 1991, researchers have tried to obtain as much information as possible about Raoul Wallenberg's fellow prisoners during his time in Soviet captivity. Over the years, the Russian side provided a number of documents about Willy Rödel, Wallenberg's long-term cellmate in Moscow Lefortovo prison from 1945-1947. However, we were never allowed to see these papers in the original, nor were we allowed to examine the file from which they had supposedly originated. Officials of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB, successor of the KGB) also routinely insisted that no records of Rödel's interrogations had been preserved. Therefore, we were enormously surprised when we came across a new book with a very long title, “Secrets of the Third Reich Diplomacy: German Diplomats, Leaders of Foreign Military Missions, Military Policemen and Police Attaches in Soviet Captivity. Documents from Investigation Files. 1944-1955”, just published in Russian as part of a series of publications by Aleksander Yakovlev Foundation (Moscow). It contains full texts of interrogation protocols of and statements written by a number of German diplomats captured by the Soviets at the end of WWII, including two statements from none other than Oberfuehrer SA Willy Rödel ! The included documents were selected, compiled, and commented on by two FSB archivists, Dr. Vasilii Khristoforov and Vladimir Makarov. In fact, Lt. General Khristoforov heads the FSB Directorate of Registration and Archival Fonds to which all FSB archives belong, including the FSB Central Archive from which we received answers to our research questions in the Wallenberg case, while Makarov is a researcher at this archive. The two statements by Willy Rödel date from December 26, 1944 and January 14, 1945, respectively, before Rödel shared a cell with Raoul Wallenberg. Rödel, a former Political Adviser to the German Ambassador Manfred von Killinger in Bucharest, became Wallenberg's cellmate in March 1945, mostly in Lefortovo Prison, one of three Moscow state security investigation facilities. The two men were held together at least until about March 1947, when both were transfered (separately) to Lubyanka Prison. In the now released statement made in January 1945, Rödel describes the activities of Sturmbannfuehrer SS Gustav Richter, Police Attache at the German Embassy, Bucharest and a German consultant of the Romanian government on the so-called “Jewish question”. This is an interesting fact, since Soviet investigators placed Raoul Wallenberg in Richter's cell in Lubyanka Prison, shortly after his arrival in Soviet captivity in February of 1945. While it does not have any bearing on our current discussion, the mere existence of Rödel's statements in the FSB archives is more than noteworthy. Khristoforov and Makarov indicate that the originals of Rödel's two statements are kept in file PF-9653 at the FSB Central Archive. It appears that this file was also the source for materials that were presented to the Swedish Working Group back in April 1993, when Russian officials turned over a set of documents about Willy Rödel. The documentation offered by Mr. Khristoforov's predecessor, Konstantin Vinogradov, included Rödel's prisoner card, an envelope containing personal items, such as his passport, a full copy of his death certificate and an autopsy report. The documents indicate that Rödel was held in Lubyanka Prison until October 1947, when he suddenly died of a heart failure (which is extremely suspicious) during a transfer to the Krasnogorsk Camp for POWs in the Moscow suburbs. Mr. Vinogradov firmly stressed that there were no other papers available about Willy Rödel . He added that the source for the few pages he had presented was a so-called "operative correspondence" file, containing communications between prison officials and security organs about imprisoned foreign diplomats. According to Vinogradov, this particular collection consists of 549 pages and includes information about one or two other cases, such as the highly sensitive one of Istvan Bethlen, the former Hungarian Prime Minister who had been arrested in 1945 and died a year later in Soviet captivity. The copies we received in 1993 from this file showed no page numbers. In 2009, the FSB explained that the pages concerning Willy Rödel were numbered 543-548. Rödel's case was apparently the last one in the collection, with the envelope bearing the number "549". Rödel's newly released statements carry the page numbers 477-484 (with a one-page gap in between). With the 1993 release covering only pages 543-549, that leaves fifty seven pages that researchers have not seen! If the early statements made by Willy Rödel in Soviet imprisonment survived even though Russian officials have told us adamantly for two decades that they did not, we cannot help but wonder if Rödel's interrogations dating from the time he was held together with Raoul Wallenberg also continue to exist. Perhaps then this is the real reason why we have not been allowed to review the fifty-seven still secret pages in this material? It is not the only point about which Russian officials have been less than truthful. FSB archivists have also repeatedly stated that no personal or investigation file was ever created for Willy Rödel. A document we found in the investigation file of the German military diplomat General Alfred Gerstenberg, which carries a handwritten notation dating from June 14, 194[6] "The original of the handwritten testimony is kept in Rödel's file", proves that this statement too is incorrect. In fact, it appears that a large part of that file has been preserved, with full knowledge of the Russian archival personnel. When we requested to review Willy Rödel's materials in the so-called "operative correspondence file" in 1993, we were not allowed to do so. The sudden surfacing of the new papers is definitely of great importance. It confirms our previously stated belief that additional documentation is indeed available and has been intentionally withheld by the Russian authorities. As we discovered in late 2009, this has been the case with other key files, such as the interrogation registers of Lubyanka prison for July 23, 1947. Despite twenty years of repeated requests, researchers had never been given the full list of prisoners who had been called for questioning on that particular day because apparently they all had knowledge of Wallenberg's presence in the Soviet Union. We found out only two years ago that the line-up had included Willy Rödel and a "Prisoner Nr. 7" who Russian officials now suddenly indicated was with "great likelihood" Raoul Wallenberg.The obvious question is: Why was this information not made available to us back in 1991?! The best possible answer is that the information was most likely withheld because it would have raised doubts about Soviet era claims that Wallenberg had died of a heart attack in prison six days earlier, on July 17, 1947. At the very least it appears that Russian officials were keen to avoid any information that would distract from that scenario. The “Introduction” to the new book signed by Khristoforov and Makarov suggests that the authors had access to additional materials about Rödel, including detailed information about his personal life and career. Most probably, the authors took this information from other withheld documents kept in the same "operative" collection. The overall evidence, unfortunately, points to a systematic effort to deflect serious inquiries and to mislead researchers. The last time we formally requested a full and direct review of the "operative correspondence file" presented by Mr. Vinogradov was in 2010. Our request was, as always, denied. Now we will definitely ask for it again and for other documentation to which we have been consistently refused access. The overall evidence, unfortunately, points to a systematic effort to deflect serious inquiries and to mislead researchers. If large parts of Willy Rödel's file survive, one has to wonder if similar records may not also have been preserved for other figures closely associated with the Wallenberg case, such as Wallenberg's chauffeur, Vilmos Langfelder, who was arrested together with him in January 1945; Langfelder's cellmate, Sandor Katona, for whom supposedly no records survive; and finally for Raoul Wallenberg himself, whose personal and investigative files were supposedly completely destroyed. At this point, we really cannot believe in mere reassurances any longer. A comprehensive review of all documentation contained in the Russian intelligence archives relevant to the Raoul Wallenberg case is urgently required. Vadim Birstein Susanne Berger |
