Klaus Kuron

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Klaus Eduard Kuron (born May 20, 1936 in Recklinghausen ) worked as an official in the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) from 1981 to 1990 for financial reasons as an unofficial employee (IM) of the Ministry for State Security of the GDR . In 1992 the Düsseldorf Higher Regional Court sentenced him to twelve years imprisonment for serious treason .

Life and education

After Kuron obtained his secondary school leaving certificate at a mathematical and scientific high school, he began training with the Federal Border Guard in 1954 . The basic training was followed by the federal passport control service, courses in radio, telex and key service in the main police station in Bonn.

Activity at the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution

In June 1962 the BfV took over Kuron, where he was made civil servant in 1969 .

The focus of his tasks was initially on counter-espionage . He worked in the relevant Department IV. Here he worked regularly with the database NADIS ( Intelligence Information System ). Its main task was to clear up the operations of the MfS against political parties, the highest federal authorities and trade unions. He was also responsible for managing the double agents who, with the knowledge of the BfV, continued to work in the GDR (countermen).

Despite his extraordinary talent and very good assessments by his superiors, he was unable to advance on the career ladder without studying, which is why his salary opportunities were exhausted.

Double agent for the MfS

Kuron reported in writing to the GDR's permanent mission in Bonn in the summer of 1981 . The letter that Kuron put in only contained one sentence in capital letters: "I am with the counter-espionage of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution". A 10-mark banknote was also included. If the MfS is interested, the next day a radio message on a certain frequency should begin with the first five digits of the ticket. The other digits on the banknote determined the date and place (three possibilities) of a meeting. The Manneken Pis monument in Brussels was elected . Kuron and representatives of the GDR did come to Brussels, but there was no contact, as both sides only observed.

It was only after months of probing in the autumn of 1982 that there was serious contact with the Enlightenment Headquarters (HVA) and Kurons had a personal conversation with Markus Wolf in Dresden . First of all, Kuron met his command officer "Günther" (real name: Günther Nehls) at the park entrance of Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna . This gave Kuron a GDR diplomatic passport. In a GDR diplomatic car both drove to the airport in Bratislava in Czechoslovakia . Kuron's second command officer "Stefan" (real name: Stefan Engelmann) was waiting there with an empty Interflug passenger plane , with which they flew to Dresden.

He justified his request to Wolf to enable his four children to study that he could not finance with his salary as head of department in Cologne. The HVA rewarded him with a one-off payment of 150,000 D-Mark plus 4,000 a month. He agreed with the HVA that the information he provided should not result in any measures by the HVA against the persons concerned. Kuron was rewarded by the State Security with almost DM 700,000. Kuron began to betray countermen, agents of the Stasi who worked for the protection of the constitution. In 1983, two further meetings were held with his senior officers in Austria and Tunisia to provide further information. When he met Wolf for the second time in 1984, Kuron received the Bronze Patriotic Order of Merit from his hand . Between 1984 and 1985, Kuron met his commanding officers in Belgium and the Seychelles to provide information .

After the defection of his boss Hans Tiedge to East Germany in August 1985 Tiedge were also attributed to the insights provided by Kuron and HVA prompted the arrest and indictment of several people. In addition to information about the methods, tasks and procedures of the BfV's counter-espionage, Kuron provided the Stasi with numerous detailed characteristics of the BfV employees. In addition, Kuron revealed completed and ongoing counter-operations as well as criteria for the search for suspicious persons at the border crossing points from the GDR to the FRG. He also revealed details about the cooperation with the Federal States' offices for the protection of the constitution and the cooperation of the BND with western secret services and the MAD . Attorney General Alexander von Stahl said in retrospect that Kuron's betrayal "paralyzed a substantial part of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution for a period of eight years"

In the period from 1985 to 1989, Kuron met his command officers in Belgium , Luxembourg , Austria or Spain , usually twice a year , in order to provide them with further information orally or by means of coded recordings and microcassettes. The last meeting with his commanding officers took place on November 9, 1989 in Dornbirn . Kuron initially used a small SHARP computer to copy the information onto microcassettes . In the course of time, the HD technology was improved so that it was possible for Kuron to transmit his radio messages to the Stasi within three seconds via the public telephone network. From 1987 Kuron also used an electronic notebook (CASIO SF 4000), which was exchanged for a new device at the meetings. In an emergency Kuron had drilled a hole in the back of the device so that he could quickly press the reset button.

For the period after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the storming of the Stasi headquarters in Normannenstrasse , Kuron was in a perfect position for the protection of the constitution. Since he was one of the most important men in the BfV's counter-espionage, he knew when and where the constitution protection, the BND and the CIA would try to buy the knowledge from former GDR agents. Through this he knew who was going to overrun and was able to warn his old comrades as the longest serving HVA agent.

Arrest and trial

On October 5, 1990, shortly after German reunification , Kuron learned from a BfV colleague that Karl Großmann, who had been deputy head of HVA Department IX for many years, was going to unpack. Kuron saw himself in danger of being blown. Immediately he went to Berlin with his Beretta pistol , which he saw as a possible solution should he find Großmann. Since nobody knew Großmann's address, the murderous idea of ​​shooting Großmann failed. Instead, his command officer "Stefan", with whom Kuron met at the Neu-Westend underground station, contacted the Soviet secret service KGB . Kuron had previously considered working with the KGB in a few situations. Stefan, Kuron and "Oleg", a KGB reconnaissance officer in Karlshorst , met under a bridge in Bernau in the north of Berlin and decided to fly Kuron to Moscow in a military plane. Kuron was first brought to the restricted military area in Berlin-Karlshorst by two men of the KGB and asked his wife in Cologne to take the next plane to Berlin. Thereupon Kuron was brought to the headquarters of the Soviet Air Force in Zossen , from where the plane was supposed to take off for Moscow in two days. At the last second, the Kurons were overwhelmed by worries about their children who would leave them alone and the uncertain future in the Soviet Union . Fearing that the KGB might fly him to the USSR against his will and, if necessary, by force , he left the Russians with the false promise that he would now continue to work as an agent of the KGB in the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution. Subsequently, the senior government official Kuron presented himself in a hotel near Braunschweig with the words "I am the mole you have been looking for a long time" then arrested Kuron on October 8, 1990.

On February 7, 1992, the Düsseldorf Higher Regional Court sentenced him to twelve years imprisonment and DM 692,000 in forfeiture money for serious treason and corruption  , the highest sentence ever passed in a German-German espionage trial. After serving two-thirds of his sentence, he was released on parole in 1998.

Fonts

literature

  • Klaus Marxen , Gerhard Werle: Criminal Justice and GDR Injustice , Volume 4, Volume 1, De Gruyter, therein from the first-instance judgment of the Düsseldorf Higher Regional Court of December 6, 1993 ( limited preview in the Google book search)
  • The preferred piece from Cologne . In: Der Spiegel . No. 42 , 1990, pp. 18-20 ( online - 15 October 1990 ).

Documentation

  • Thomas Knauf: Klaus Kuron - Spy on his own behalf , documentary, D 2004

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke , Memoirs from the Stasi milieu. Confessions, Legends, Self-Transfiguration , in: From Politics and Contemporary History B 30–31 / 2001 of July 20, 2001, pp. 6–13
  2. ↑ Heribert Schwan: Spies at the Center of Power: How the Stasi has spied on all governments since Adenauer . Munich 2019, p. 312 .
  3. ↑ Heribert Schwan: Spies at the Center of Power: How the Stasi has spied on all governments since Adenauer . Munich 2019, p. 312 f .
  4. ↑ Heribert Schwan: Spies at the Center of Power: How the Stasi has spied on all governments since Adenauer . Munich 2019, p. 312 f .
  5. ^ Criminal justice and GDR injustice: Documentation . tape 4 , no. 1 . Berlin 2004, p. 101 .
  6. ^ Criminal justice and GDR injustice: Documentation . tape 4 , no. 1 . Berlin 2004.
  7. ↑ Klaus Rösler, Peter Richter: Wolfs West Spione: an insider report . 1992, p. 58 .
  8. ^ Frank Bachner: The biggest espionage affair in the Federal Republic: Klaus Kuron wants more. Tagesspiegel, September 5, 2018, accessed January 15, 2020 .
  9. ^ Frank Bachner: The biggest espionage affair in the Federal Republic: Klaus Kuron wants more. Tagesspiegel, September 5, 2018, accessed January 15, 2020 .
  10. ↑ Master Spy for two A13s . DER SPIEGEL, February 1992, p. 28–33 ( spiegel.de ).
  11. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke, Memoirs from the Stasi milieu. Confessions, Legends, Self-Transfiguration , in: From Politics and Contemporary History B 30–31 / 2001 of July 20, 2001, pp. 6–13
  12. ↑ Heribert Schwan: Spies at the Center of Power: How the Stasi has spied on all governments since Adenauer . Munich 2019, p. 314-316 .
  13. ^ Petra Schäfter: Criminal Justice and GDR Injustice: Documentation . Espionage. tape 4 , no. 1 . Berlin 2004, p. 108 f .
  14. ↑ Kuron cites lack of money as a reason for espionage . Neue Zeit, January 1992, p. 4 .
  15. ↑ Helmut R. Hammerich: "Always at the enemy!": The Military Shield Service (MAD) 1956-1990 . Göttingen 2019, p. 355 .
  16. ↑ Alexander Reichenbach: Chief of the Spies: The Markus Wolf Story . Stuttgart, S. 90 .
  17. ↑ Heribert Schwan: Spies at the Center of Power: How the Stasi has spied on all governments since Adenauer . Munich 2019, p. 316 f .
  18. ^ Georg Mascolo: Among Germans . Süddeutsche Zeitung, Munich January 15, 2020, p. 3 .
  19. ↑ Master Spy for two A13s . DER SPIEGEL, February 1992, p. 28–33 ( spiegel.de ).
  20. ↑ Heribert Schwan: Spies at the Center of Power: How the Stasi has spied on all governments since Adenauer . Munich 2019, p. 318 f .
  21. ↑ Alexander Reichenbach: Chief of the spies. The Markus Wolf story . Stuttgart 1992, p. 86 .
  22. ↑ Peter Richter, Klaus Rösler: Wolf's West Spies: An Insider Report . 1992, p. 167 .
  23. ↑ Master Spy for two A13s . DER SPIEGEL, February 1992, p. 28–33 ( spiegel.de ).
  24. ↑ Alexander Reichenbach: Chief of the spies. The Markus Wolf story . Stuttgart 1992, p. 87 .
  25. ↑ Heribert Schwan: Spies at the Center of Power: How the Stasi has spied on all governments since Adenauer . Munich 2019, p. 319 .
  26. ↑ Peter Richter, Klaus Rösler: Wolf's West Spies: An Insider Report . 1992, p. 167 .
  27. ↑ Annual history 1992. Accessed on June 23, 2019 .
  28. ↑ Heribert Schwan: Spies at the Center of Power: How the Stasi has spied on all governments since Adenauer . Munich 2019, p. 320 .
  29. ↑ K. Eichner et al. a. (Ed.): Scouts in the West. Retrieved June 23, 2019 (review).
  30. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke: Historical revisionism from an MfS perspective ( Memento from June 27, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 132 kB)
personal data
SURNAME Kuron, Klaus
ALTERNATIVE NAMES IM Berger (alias); IM star (alias)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German double agent (Federal Republic of Germany, GDR)
DATE OF BIRTH May 20, 1936
PLACE OF BIRTH Recklinghausen