A DEFECTOR FROM MOSCOW'S KGB INTELLIGENCE SERVICE SAID TODAY THAT TWO OUT OF EVERY FIVE SOVIET DISSIDENTS WERE IN FACT KGB SPIES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000201700002-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 6, 2010
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: February 12, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/06: CIA-RDP90-00552R000201700002-1
REUTERS
12 February 1986
By Christopher Hanson STAT
WASHINGTON
A defector from Moscow's KGB intelligence service said today that two out of
every five Soviet dissidents were in fact KGB spies.
The defector, former high KGB official Ilya Dzhirkvelov, also told reporters
at a news briefing that Soviet intelligence had compromised Western journalists
-- including American, British, and French correspondents -- who agreed to write
false or misleading articles in exchange for money.
Dzhirkvelov, who defected in 1980, declined to name any journalist who had
been bribed.
A more common KGB method was to offer exclusive information to a
correspondent and later collect "payment" in the form of articles which spread
"disinformation" (deliberately false or misleading information) to advance
Soviet interests, he said.
Dzhirkvelov, who joined Soviet intelligence during World War II and later
sought to recruit Western diplomats and journalists as Kremlin agents, said the
KGB could arrest all Soviet dissident human rights activists within two hours.
Instead it opted to infiltrate dissident groups in order to learn the
identities of new activist recruits.
"Among five, maybe two are KGB agents," he said of the dissidents, adding he
knew of at least one supposed ex-dissident, in "exile" in the West for some
time, who in fact had been a Kremlin spy. He refused to name the person.
Imprisoned Soviet human rights activist Anatoly Shcharansky was released
early today in a major East-West spy swap at the Glienecke bridge checkpoint
between East and West Berlin. Shcharansky had been jailed by Moscow as a U.S.
spy, but Washington denied he was one.
Dzhirkvelov said the dissident had left himself vulnerable by talking too
much -- referring to the location of Soviet military facilities in talks with
Westerners, which in the Soviet Union technically amounted to espionage.
Dzhirkvelov said he had participated in a campaign to discredit conservative
West German politician Franz Josef Strauss in 1960, helping plant articles in
Swiss, French, and West German publications that falsely claimed Strauss was a
CIA agent.
Strauss, a staunch anti-Communist, was regarded at the time as a strong
candidate to become chancellor. Dzhirkvelov said Moscow beleived the bogus
articles were what prevented his ascension. Strauss is now premier of Bavaria.
Dzhirkvelov spoke at a luncheon organized by U.S. scholars who publish
Disinformation, a monthly magazine which attempts to predict Soviet propaganda
moves.
The magazine's editor, Georgetown University professor Roy Godson, said a
recent example of Soviet disinformation was an article in an Indian newspaper
that claimed the killer disease AIDS had been caused by a CIA medical
experiment which misfired. Godson said the KGB had "planted" the article.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/06: CIA-RDP90-00552R000201700002-1