Kompromat

Helga Brun laughed; the audience laughed. The TV cameras caught the moment and broadcast it to the world. The image of the Russian president standing next to the chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany, with an extremely photogenic tiger cub in his arms, was one of the defining moments of President Popov’s visit that summer to Berlin, the capital of the Federal Republic of Germany. The Chinese government, back in the 1970s, had famously presented the Berlin Zoo with a baby panda, but Bao-Bao had recently died (of old age, nothing more sinister), leaving a gaping hole in an animal-loving nation’s hearts.

‘We must think of a name for our new guest,’ Helga Brun continued. ‘We should launch a nation-wide consultation. A referendum like our friends, the British, do.’

The audience laughed again. This was the Chancellor at her warmest, most human.

‘Perhaps they’ll decide to name her Helga!’ Popov quipped.

Berlin Zoo is situated at the western end of the Tiergarten, the great park which extends all the way to the Brandenburg Gate. On the north-eastern edge of the Tiergarten stands the Federal Chancellery building.

‘Let’s walk back across the park,’ Helga Brun suggested. ‘Some exercise will do us good.’

If Helga Brun had deliberately intended to throw her security detail into confusion, she certainly succeeded. The German chancellor and the Russian president set off on foot across the Tiergarten while a phalanx of special agents trotted along behind them at a respectful distance.

‘Such a brilliant idea, bringing us that little tiger cub, Igor,’ Helga Brun said. ‘Not taken from the wild, surely?’

‘No, born in Moscow Zoo. Her mother had a litter of five. Too many really. I’m sure she was glad to give one up in the interests of international diplomacy.’

‘Her loss is our gain,’ Helga said.

Popov took her arm. There was no way anyone could overhear them. ‘Quite like old times, isn’t it, Mina?’

He used her codename deliberately.

Growing up in East Germany, in the German Democratic Republic or GDR, at a time when East Germany was still part of the Soviet Empire, Helga Brun – from the KGB’s point of view – had obvious potential as a possible agent. She was young; she was pretty; she was phenomenally intelligent. She spoke Russian fluently. She had not only studied the language, she had visited Moscow twice on state-sponsored trips. She had come to Popov’s attention when he was head of the KGB office in Dresden and she was one of the youngest ever professors at Leipzig University, where she specialized in modern languages.

Of course, when the Berlin Wall fell at the end of 1989, the whole world changed. It certainly changed for the KGB in Dresden. Popov remembered that December evening so clearly. From a side-balcony of the KGB’s mansion on Angelikastrasse, he had watched the crowds ransacking the hated Stasi headquarters. Then a bunch of them had broken off to attack the KGB office itself. In what was probably one of the most defining moments of his career, Popov had confronted them unarmed.

‘This house is strictly guarded,’ he had said in fluent German. ‘My soldiers have weapons. And I have given them orders. If anyone enters the compound, they are to open fire.’

Later, of course, the story was much embellished. In some versions, guards were positioned with AK-47s at the windows of the building ready to shoot. Others claimed that Lieutenant-Colonel Popov, as he then was, had brandished a pistol when addressing the crowds. But the key point was through his prompt and successful intervention Popov gained vital time.

Next day, they had destroyed most of the files; communications, lists of contacts, agents’ networks etc. They all went up in smoke. But Popov and his colleagues managed to spirit some of them back to Moscow. One of those files was Mina’s.

Well, he had protected her back then, Popov thought. Thanks to him, KGB files from the Dresden office never fell into the hands of the government of the newly unified Germany in the way the Stasi files did. Had they done so, the government would certainly have learned about Mina and it would not have taken them long to discover Mina’s real identity. If they had, Helga Brun’s brilliant career might have taken a very different turn.

‘Those were the days weren’t they, Mina?’ Popov repeated. ‘Do you remember when we walked along the banks of the Elbe together?’

‘Don’t call me Mina. I’m not Mina.’

‘You’re lucky the Stasi didn’t keep a file too.’

Helga Brun was suddenly indignant. ‘I would never have worked for the Stasi. Disgusting bunch!’

She turned to face him. She had loved him then. They were virtually the same age. And there had been this powerful physical attraction. She had once, daringly, asked him, ‘Igor, were you born with an erection?’

By this time they were nearing the far end of the Tiergarten. The security detail was closing up on them. The Chancellery building loomed ahead.