Operation Gladio

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History

Leadership

US intelligence

Foreign intelligence

Corporate fronts

Criminal activities

Terrorist attacks

Child sex rings

Related articles: Dutroux affair, Wonderland Club

Purposes

Fighting leftism

Controlling governments

NATO countries

Italy

Belgium

Related article: Dutroux affair

Denmark

France

Germany

Greece

Netherlands

Norway

Portugal

Turkey

Main article: Turkish deep state

Non-NATO countries

Austria

Finland

Spain

Sweden

Switzerland

South Africa

Related activities

Operation Condor

Main article: Operation Condor

References

External links

  • Washington Post, "CIA ORGANIZED SECRET ARMY IN WESTERN EUROPE", 1990/11/14
  • Alleged quote from Italian neo-fascist Vincenzo Vinciguerra: "When you were on the Right you were not supposed to attack the State or its representatives. You were supposed to attack civilians, women, children, innocent people from outside the political arena. For one simple reason: To force the Italian public to turn to the State turn to the regime and ask for greater security. This was precisely the role of the right in Italy. It placed itself at the service of the State which created a strategy aptly called the "Strategy of Tension" in so far as they had to get ordinary people to accept that at any moment over a period of 30 years, from 1960 to the mid eighties a State of emergency could be declared. So, people would willingly trade part of their freedom for the security of being able to walk the streets, go on trains or enter a bank. This is the political logic behind all the bombings. They remain unpunished because the state cannot condemn itself."
  • Rob Couteau, "NATO’s Secret Armies, Operation Gladio, and JFK", 2019/07/15

Daniele Ganser work

Child sex rings

  • Netherlands involvement in the global pedophilia business
    • According to Wikipedia, a Dutch moral law passed in 1971 decriminalized all pornography including child pornography, and there were few attempts to investigate the trade until the mid-1980s
    • According to Wikipedia, from 1990 to 2002 the age of consent was effectively 12: it was possible for adults and children as young as 12 to have "consensual" sexual encounters, although parents could still complain
    • Francis Shelden, the operator of the 1970s pedophile ring on North Fox Island in Michigan, escaped prosecution by fleeing to the Netherlands where assumed the name Frank Torey
    • John D. Stamford and the Spartacus Club (which advertised the Elm Guest House)
      • Sunday People, "MISTER EVIL BEHIND CHILD VICE HOLIDAYS", 1983/02/06 (cover page, article on page 5): "Boys of 12 or even younger are being lured into prostitution by the activities of 43-year-old John Stamford. Stamford, a bearded former Brighton businessman, runs a sinister outfit known as the Spartacus Organization. Its purpose: to publish holiday guides for homosexuals suggesting the best places in the world for picking up child loves. They detail beaches and other places where boys willing to sell themselves for sex may be found and suggest ways of approaching the boys, how much to pay them and list hotels and clubs where children will be admitted with no questions asked. [...] He compiles the Spartacus guides along with books and other literature of interest to paedophiles, from an office in Amsterdam. Stamford fled to the Dutch capital from Britain in 1972 following convictions for sending obscene material through the post."
      • The Guardian, "PIE man: legal move", 1984/10/17: "Proceedings are under way to extradite a child-sex campaigner, Steven Smith, from Holland to face trial at the Old Bailey, the Home Office said last night. But it is understood that the 30-year-old leader of the Paedophile Information Exchange, who was on bail when he fled to Amsterdam in August, has asked the Dutch authorities for political asylum. It is thought he first took refuge at the secret headquarters of the international paedophile information network, Spartacus, in Baarn, on the outskirts of Amsterdam."
      • Sunday People, "The evil men behind child sex empire", 1985/06/16
      • Sunday Times, "Scandal of Britons who buy young boys for £3 a night", 1986/08/03 (full page, photo of Stamford, first part of page, second part of page, third part of page)
      • London Times, "John Stamford `ran child sex ring for clients worldwide’", 1994/11/24: "John Stamford, 55, was charged after police raided his premises last year in the small Belgian town of Geel near the Dutch border, and, it is alleged, found a cache of paedophile magazines. Publication and distribution of such material is illegal under Belgian law, but carries a maximum prison term of one year. However, in addition to the relatively minor criminal charge, Mr Stamford faces a parallel civil action in the same court brought by four human rights organisations, alleging that the magazine acted as the front for Club Spartacus, an international paedophile ring with an estimated 30,000 members. [...] The details of each of the members, including their sexual preferences, the desired age of the children and preferred countries of origin were stored on a computer, each entry guarded with a secret code. The members received personalised “lists” of children, mainly outside Europe. The client would then select a child and indicate his choice to a local middleman. In one of the documents obtained by Terres des Hommes, Mr Stamford offers “boys of every age, shape and type”, adding that “between January and May 1978 I personally tested lots of these boys”."
      • The Guardian, "Child sex case minister dies", 1995/12/30: "John Stamford, 56, a former church minister, was scheduled to answer charges brought by children's rights groups alleging he provided information on child prostitutes to pedophiles around the world. It is believed that he died on Wednesday of a heart attack in hospital near his home in northern Belgium. "His death will probably mean the end of all judicial action," said Bernard Boeton, an official of Terre des Hommes (Land of Mankind), one of the organisations pressing charges. [...] According to the prosecution, Stamford used a homosexual travel guide called Spartacus as a front fora mailing service offering information on child prostitution in Thailand, Brazil, the Philippines and other nations."
      • Exaro News, "Files reveal who turned Elm Guest House into paedo brothel" by David Pallister and David Hencke, 2013/02/02: "Papers seized by police name the man who helped turn a guest house into a paedophile brothel allegedly used by MPs and other VIPs. Exaro can reveal that the key figure who persuaded Carole Kasir, co-manager of the guest house, to create a haven for homosexual men to have sex with boys is Peter Glencross, who was part of an underground paedophile network called ‘Spartacus’. [...] Detectives seized the papers in a raid last month. The papers suggest that two men persuaded Carole Kasir to change the guest house into a place for homosexual men in 1982. According to the files, they introduced her to Glencross, a South African based in Holland, one of whose roles was to create a network of venues for Spartacus members. Spartacus International, a gay guide, identified Glencross as its commercial manager. The Spartacus Club used it to attract members. [...] Carole Kasir, who died at the age of 47 in 1990, may have been unaware of Glencross’s connection with Spartacus. But the guest house placed advertisements in the gay Press that signalled it as a place for homosexuals who want to have sex with boys. [...] Spartacus Club and Spartacus International were then run from Amsterdam by John Stamford, a former Roman Catholic priest from Lancashire, who moved to Holland after being convicted in England of sending pornographic material through the post. The club was reported to have 25,000 British members."
    • Rev. Donald H. Mader - a US expatriate and former co-editor of pro-pedophilia magazine Paidika (the same one to which Ralph Underwager of the False Memory Syndrome Foundation and Hollida Wakefield gave an interview)
      • BoyWiki page on D.H. Mader - says that he "majored in history with minors in religion and art at Michigan State University"
      • NAMBLA Bulletin Vol. 12 No. 4, "US photographer convicted in Amsterdam", 1991/05: "Donald Mader, a renowned photographer [...], was convicted last December of publicly displaying pornographic photographs of minors. The case stemmed from a 1987 exhibit of his works at Intermale, a gay book store in Amsterdam. Police had raided the store and confiscated 15 of Mader's works. Mader, a US citizen and former co-editor of Paidika, was the first person to be tried under the new Dutch child pornography law, which bans any nude depiction of a person younger than 16 if presented with erotic intent. A judge ruled that two of the 15 images were erotic, and hence illegal, and claimed, further, that the boys had been sexually abused. [...] The verdict was widely criticized in the mainstream press and denounced as irrational and promoting censorship, but there does not seem to be any move afoot to alter the strict porn law now that the Dutch age of consent has been lowered from 16 to 12."
    • Paul Bonacci allegations
      • In Anton Chaitkin's 1993 interview with Paul Bonacci ("Franklin Case Witnesses Implicate FBI and U.S. Elites in Child-Torture and Murder"), it was reported that Bonacci smuggled child pornography in the Netherlands on behalf of NAMBLA members: "Trips on behalf of the North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA), the pedophile group now given semi-official status by the United Nations. Paul cites travel to Netherlands and Germany carrying child pornography for subesequent "import" to the U.S.A. to avoid prosecution. In Amsterdam, he names "Charles Hester," and the British "Tommie Carter," who had on computer a global list of child pornography users. NAMBLA is also cited for organizing auctions of children."
    • ITV, The Boy Business, 1997
    • 1998 case of child pornography in Zandvoort
      • NRC Handelsblad, "Internationale toorn over zaak met kinderporno", 1998/07/18
      • NRC Handelsblad, "Porno in de polder", 1998/07/21
      • WIRED, "Dutch in Dutch Over Porn Bungle", 1998/07/27: "Dutch justice authorities, already disgraced by accusations of bungling a probe of an Internet kid-porn ring, braced for a fresh barrage of criticism Monday when news emerged that a civil servant faces child pornography charges. The man, who worked in the Justice Ministry's computer applications management department, was fired last week for downloading pornography from the Internet and distributing it through the ministry's internal computer network. "He downloaded a diverse range of material, probably including child pornography," spokesman Wijnand Stevens said. The public prosecutor's office on Monday confirmed that the man, who has not been identified, has been charged with the possession of child pornography. No trial date has been set. [...] "Investigations have shown that others could and did view the material via the internal network and we are currently looking into who knew or could have known of this," spokesman Stevens said. He stressed that the ministry's investigation was not linked to the so-called Zandvoort child pornography scandal. [...] The Justice Ministry has come under fire in recent weeks for perceived laxity in tracking down the Zandvoort ring, suspected of distributing pornographic pictures of children as young as 2."
      • Associated Press, "HOLLAND DISCOVERY: Internet child porn ring brings painful fallout", 1998/07/30: "But the Dutch are not ready to tolerate the pornography discovered on computer drives and diskettes in mid-July, when police raided a cluttered apartment in the sleepy North Sea town of Zandvoort and the scandal broke. The apartment owner, convicted German pedophile Gerrie Ulrich, 49, was shot to death in Pisa, Italy, in June, allegedly by a rival gang member. Dutch authorities are seeking extradition of the slaying suspect, Robert van der Plancken, 24, of Belgium. The seized materials include digital photos and video that depict children as young as 12 months old being raped and sodomized. [...] This week, the scandal took a startling new turn. A top employee of the Justice Ministry, which is leading the investigation, was ousted for downloading child pornography from his office computer for personal use. [...] Authorities say little if any of the material seized in Zandvoort was actually produced in the Netherlands; they think much of it came from central and eastern Europe and originally was posted on the World Wide Web in the United States."
    • The Guardian, "When sex abuse can lead to murder" by Nick Davies, 2000/11/26
    • Joris Demmink affair and the Rolodex investigation
    • Sanne Bosma, "The Netherlands: A Leading Distributor And Producer of Child Pornography", 2018/01/24
  • 1980s-2000s Casa Pia case in Portugal
  • Portuguese child abductions
  • Colonia Dignidad - a child abuse cult in Chile ran by a Nazi pedophile with connections to the Augusto Pinochet regime and CIA
    • American Scholar, "The Torture Colony", 2008/09/01: "Deep in the Andean foothills of Chile’s central valley lives a group of German expatriates, the members of a utopian experiment called Colonia Dignidad. [...] Investigations by Amnesty International and the governments of Chile, Germany, and France, as well as the testimony of former colonos who, over the years, managed to escape the colony, have revealed evidence of terrible crimes: child molestation, forced labor, weapons trafficking, money laundering, kidnapping, torture, and murder."
      • "All this was made possible by one man, a charismatic, Evangelical preacher named Paul Schaefer, who founded the community and who, until several years ago, remained very much in charge. [...] It is said that Schaefer tried to join the elite Nazi SS corps a few years later, but was rejected because of this infirmity. [...] After Germany’s surrender, Schaefer worked for a short time in the Evangelical Free Church as a youth leader, but he was fired when suspicion arose that he had somehow mistreated the boys in his care. [...] Schaefer’s first experiment in community building did not end well. The mothers of two young boys living in the orphanage charged that he had molested their children, an accusation taken seriously enough for local judicial authorities to issue a warrant for his arrest."
      • "For Schaefer and his pilgrims, evil manifested itself most tangibly in the scourge of international communism. [...] To assure the defense of his utopia, Schaefer organized a paramilitary unit of several dozen men, trained in military tactics and martial arts."
      • "A still worse punishment awaited in rooms nine and 14 of the hospital, where Baar and other colonos unfortunate enough to draw the full measure of Schaefer’s fury were subjected to shock treatments. A female physician worked the machines, her manner detached and clinical. Patients were strapped down and fitted with crowns attached by wires to a voltage machine. Baar told me how the doctor seemed to enjoy watching him suffer."
      • "At the opposite end of the social spectrum from the rebels was a group of boys Schaefer affectionately called his “sprinters.” [...] For the boys lucky enough to be chosen, the position brought pride and power. But this special status was also a source of trouble for them. It was an open secret that Schaefer was a pedophile, just as the authorities had accused him of being long before in Germany. [...] His routine, it later emerged, included feeding them sedatives, washing them with a sponge, and sexual manipulation."
      • "In June 1974, Pinochet created the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA)—a secret police force, separate from the rest of Chile’s intelligence establishment and loyal only to him, designed to hunt down and eliminate his political enemies. DINA agents routinely kidnapped regime opponents and delivered them to secret torture and execution centers located throughout Chile—including Colonia Dignidad."
      • "Colonia Dignidad, according to a former DINA agent assigned there in the mid-1970s, maintained powerful radio equipment, facilitating communication between DINA commanders in Chile and their agent saboteurs and assassins stationed abroad. In 2005, Michael Townley, an American expatriate and former DINA officer implicated in several high-profile assassinations and bombings, testified to a Chilean judge that the Colonia had also housed a secret laboratory, where government scientists developed chemical weapons. Schaefer’s primary contribution to Pinochet’s operations, however, came in the instruction of DINA agents in the science of torture. Soon after the coup, arrested political dissidents began to disappear into Colonia Dignidad."
      • "Contract torturing was not the worst of Schaefer’s collusion with the Pinochet regime: executions, perhaps of entire groups of prisoners, were sometimes carried out. No bodies have ever been found, but some remorseful DINA agents have talked. [...] One former colono recently told Chilean government investigators that, on Schaefer’s orders, he once drove a busload of 35 political prisoners up into the Colonia’s wooded hills and left them in an isolated spot by the side of a dirt road. As he drove back down alone, he heard machine gun fire echoing through the forest."
      • "Over the years, there have been numerous attempts to investigate Colonia Dignidad, most compromised from the start by Schaefer’s network of protectors within the Chilean political and judicial establishment."
    • BBC, "Chile cult leader Schaefer dies in Chile prison", 2010/04/24: "Paul Schaefer, a former Nazi army corporal who founded a cult-like community in Chile, has died in jail. Schaefer, who was 88, was serving a 20-year sentence for sexually abusing children at the Colonia Dignidad, some during Chile's military dictatorship. The former Baptist preacher established the colony in southern Chile in 1961, after fleeing Germany to escape separate child abuse charges. [...] He had fled Chile in 1997 and was convicted of sex crimes in absentia. He was found hiding in Argentina in March 2005 and sent back for a fresh trial. A Chilean congressional report has said that Colonia Dignidad - which means Dignity Colony - operated as a "state within a state" during the Pinochet regime, thanks to Schaefer's close ties to the country's ruling elite."
    • Santiago Times, "Colonia Dignidad Cult’s Second-In-Command Flees Chile", 2011/05/25: "Dr. Hartmutt Hopp, a top authority in the Colonia Dignidad cult of German immigrants, fled Chile on board a helicopter and is believed to be in Germany, according to investigative reporters at CIPER. Hopp was under house arrest in Chile while awaiting trial for human rights crimes committed during Chile’s dictatorship (1973-1990). [...] During the military dictatorship Schäfer, Hopp, and the colony’s other exiles – many of whom were once members of the German Gestapo – aligned with Gen. Augusto Pinochet and the dictator’s secret police, the DINA. Around 100 prisoners were reportedly murdered within the colony compound. The Talca Court of Appeals also sentenced Hopp to five years in prison for being an accomplice to Schäfer’s sexual abuses. [...] On Monday morning 18 members of Chile’s Investigations Police (PDI) reached Villa Baviera to arrest Karl Van den Berg, Gerhard Mucke, Kurt Schnellenkamp, Matthias Gerlach, Tenate Feitag, Gerd Seewald, Gisela Gruhlke and Friedhelm Zeitner"
    • David Cardona, "I Found the Devil in Colonia Dignidad", 2012/08/06: "In his native Germany Shafer got medical training and spent WWII as a doctor for the Luftwaffe. [...] Everyone had to work 12 to 14 hours for food each day, in complete silence. These were typical mind control techniques probably learned through his exposure to similar during his tenure in the German Military. These Techniques were designed to isolate individuals, keeping their minds in a state of fatigue, bordering on trauma making them more susceptible to outside stimuli & post hypnotic suggestion. [...] In 2005, another former German national from Colonia Dignidad was charged with torture and sexual abuse—her name was Gisela Seewald, and she defended herself by claiming she merely followed Shafer’s orders. [...] What’s most disturbing is the nature of her crimes: she administered electroshock therapy and a battery of sedatives and various psychoactive drugs to the children. To anyone familiar with MKULTRA and Project Bluebird this is probably the most ominous combination you could hear."
    • Al Jazeera, "The Colony: Chile's dark past uncovered", 2013/12/15: "It also served as a haven for Nazi fugitives - such as Walter Rauff, the inventor of the portable gas chamber, and Joseph Mengele, the so-called 'Angel of Death' - who were permitted to hide out there in exchange for overseeing sophisticated forms of torture. All of this took place with the full knowledge of the Pinochet regime, whose notorious intelligence chief, General Manuel Contreras, would often visit the site. In The Colony: Chile's dark past uncovered, the truth about what took place inside the Colony is revealed through the story of Winfried Hempel."
    • Al Jazeera, "'Living in hell'", 2013/12/15
    • Proyecto Internacional de Derechos Humanos (Memoria Viva) page on Michael Vernon Townley Welch: "Michael Vernon Townley Welch, agente de la CIA y jefe de la Agrupación Quetropillán de la Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional (DINA). Involucrado en un sin numero de crímenes en Chile y el exterior, incluyendo el asesinato en Buenos Aires del General Carlos Pratt, el asesinato en Washington D.C. del canciller chileno Orlando Letelier, el atentado en Roma contra del dirigente democratacristiano Bernardo Leighton, el secuestro y asesinato del diplomático español Carmelo Soria. En su casa de Lo Curro, Santiago, se utilizó para la fabricación gas Sarín que fue utilizado en el asesinato de presos politicos. Participo tambien en el entrenamiento de agentes de la DINA en "Colonia Dignidad", junto a otros "instructores" de tortura chilenos y brasileños."
    • (TODO: verify) mquee, "Paul Schaefer-Demon of Two Nations", 2018/12/28: "This infirmity however, did not prevent Schaefer from being assigned as a nurse to a hospital located on the western front during World War II. As a nurse he became proficient at administering drugs and tranquilizers. [...] Among those following him now were former members of the German Gestapo, the SS, and various other Nazi organizations. Chief among his elders were Albert Schreiber, appointed Head of Security; Gerhard Mucke, Head of Schaefer's bodyguards; and Winfried Schmidtke, Head of Electronic Surveillance. The colony was protected by barbed wire fencing, armed guards equipped with walkie-talkies, and watchdogs. [...] Schaefer invited many influential Chileans to parties and extravagant dinners. They included powerful businessmen, high ranking politicians, police chiefs, judges,as well as authorities in the German embassy located in Santiago. Many of these officials were foolish enough to fall into the trap of taking part in illicit sexual activity and child molestation. Those so foolish, were secretly photographed and Schaefer created and kept secret files on them. This documentation of course, was used to blackmail and exert influence on the trapped parties."
  • 2003 case in Chile
    • SFGate, "Chile awakens to child prostitution after scandal", 2003/11/24: "An investigation into a suspected pedophile ring headed by a wealthy businessman has caused this conservative nation to suddenly ponder a previously ignored social problem -- child prostitution. In October, Claudio Spiniak, 55, and six colleagues, were charged with using a luxury gym he owns for sadomasochistic orgies with children. He has also been accused of producing and distributing child pornography. The scandal has linked two right-wing senators of the Independent Democratic Union party (UDI) to the pedophile ring as well as prominent businessmen and four police officers, who were arrested last week for obstruction of justice. [...] The suspected senators are Carlos Bombal and Jovino Novoa, the ex-mayor of Santiago and former deputy minister of the General Secretariat under former dictator Augusto Pinochet, respectively. Novoa has been accused of raping a 16- year-old girl and hiring her out as a prostitute. Moreover, Daniel Calvo, a respected judge who had been investigating the alleged link between politicians and the pedophile ring, was removed from the case early this month after revealing that he had been a regular visitor to a gay bathhouse where children were welcome."
  • Former Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi having sex with underage girls
  • Andreas V. and Mario S. in Germany
    • Daily Mail, "German police lose ALL the evidence against two paedophiles who allegedly raped more than 30 children at least 1,000 times at rundown campsite", 2019/02/22: "German police have admitted to losing almost all the incriminating digital evidence against two paedophiles accused of sexually assaulting least 31 children as young as four, allegedly raping their victims more than 1,000 times. Main suspect Andreas V., 56, and his campsite neighbour Mario S., 33, allegedly sexually assaulted dozens of children at a rundown caravan park in Luegde, a town in the western German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The case has shocked Germany, but despite the extremely serious allegations, police are now saying that almost all the incriminating digital evidence has gone missing - and that they apparently forgot to make backups."
    • CNN, "Children and parents reported sex abuse for years in central Germany. Why did no one believe them?", 2019/04/05: "German police believe Andreas V. went on to become the ringleader of a pedophile gang that used his family's camper van as its base of operations for decades, abusing dozens of children and recording their crimes for profit on the dark web. Authorities say they collected ten computers, nine mobile phones, more than 40 hard drives and more than 400 additional data carriers as evidence from Andreas V and two other men. The case has scandalized the nation, especially after police recently admitted that some of the data confiscated as evidence has been "lost" while in police hands. Germans are left wondering how both law enforcement and social services failed to stop the abuse, despite numerous red flags."
      • "Two other men, a 48-year old and a 33-year old, were arrested on suspicion of exchanging child pornography with Andreas V.

        "The investigations so far give reason to fear that the perpetrators have committed more than 1,000 acts of abuse, going back to the year 2008," police said in an initial statement.

        "In addition to investigating allegations of serious sexual abuse, more lines of investigation have emerged including child pornography, extending to the internet. Furthermore, the offices responsible for child care in the district of Lippe are being investigated for possible criminal acts," said the statement."
      • "Parents had tried to raise the alarm about Andreas V. before.

        In 2016, a local father, Jens Ruzsitska, said he had seen Andreas V. groping children at a birthday party. Ruzsitska punched him and accused him of "feeling up" the children before storming out.

        Police confirmed to CNN that Ruzsitska filed a police report of the incident at the time but say no further action was taken.

        Asked why no action was taken back then, the local prosecutor told CNN: "All evidence is being pursed and taken seriously.""
      • "Despite this allegation against him, Andreas V. was granted permission to become the guardian of a six-year-old foster daughter that same year.

        The local Youth Welfare Office has now launched an investigation into how Andreas V. was allowed to become a foster parent.

        When contacted by CNN, the Youth Welfare Office confirmed Andreas V. had been reported twice in 2016 for "possible child endangerment," even as Andreas V was regularly being assessed by youth welfare officers. In October of that year, however, the youth welfare office found no evidence of child endangerment and granted him guardianship of the foster child.

        However, District Administrator Tjark Bartels, who has responsibility for overseeing the Youth Welfare Office, told CNN there is now evidence that Andreas V.'s application to become a foster parent had been manipulated and "beautified."

        "An employee has admitted that he subsequently manipulated the files of the Youth Welfare Office, adding a note to complete the file," Bartels said in a statement sent to CNN. Bartels would not clarify how the file had been manipulated, citing the ongoing investigation."
      • "As if failing to act on reports of child abuse wasn't bad enough, now police have admitted that evidence -- at least 155 CDs and DVDs confiscated from Andreas V.'s home -- has been lost while in police custody. The material was kept in an aluminum suitcase and a black folder that was supposed to have been sealed as evidence. It was reported as missing weeks later."
      • "For families of the Luegde victims, there are too many troubling questions that have not yet been answered, including whether their abuse was recorded on the videos and photographs now held by police.

        "Why are CDs disappearing? Who was on those CDs? Is someone being protected? We have to ask these questions," said lawyer Roman von Alvensleben.

        "Fifteen terabytes of data were found, reportedly videos were sent out and possibly a business was operated. It must become clear who had access to that data and who else was involved. I suspect there are still many other connections," von Alvensleben added."
  • South Africa pedophile ring
    • BBC, "South Africa's 'paedophile' minister and a mysterious death", 2018/08/15
      • "South Africa has been gripped by the mysterious death of former police officer Mark Minnie, just a week after he revealed horrific details about an alleged paedophile ring in the once-feared white-minority government that portrayed itself as being made up of devout Christian men.

        Minnie, 58, was found with a bullet to his head, but many people are refusing to believe the police version - that he took his own life at the farm of a friend near the coastal city of Port Elizabeth."
      • "Minnie and journalist Chris Steyn co-authored The Lost Boys of Bird Island, which details shocking allegations against Magnus Malan, the once-powerful defence minister who was accused of setting up death squads and sanctioning military raids on neighbouring states as he fought to maintain white-supremacist rule in South Africa in the 1980s and 1990s."
      • "Malan was part of a regime which believed that the Bible justified racism - and they saw themselves as defending their faith, families, and race from being over-run by "godless communists" and "uncivilised blacks".

        But secretly, Minnie alleged, Malan was part of a paedophile ring which raped boys - mostly of mixed race - during "fishing excursions" on Bird Island, a declared nature reserve near Port Elizabeth. The boys were flown to the island in military helicopters, made drunk during barbecues - and then sexually abused, he alleged."
      • "Minnie said he had been building a case against Malan, but was forced to abandon his investigation after senior police officers in the regime, then led by Pieter Willem Botha, intervened and a prosecutor wrote in "fat red letters" on the docket: "Any investigation into this matter should be discontinued immediately.""
      • "The book alleged that the paedophile ring, which operated in the 1980s, included then-Environmental Affairs Minister John Wiley and wealthy businessman and diver Dave Allen. Minnie said he had, in fact, arrested Allen for allegedly having sex with children and for possessing child pornography.

        Allen, Minnie added, had sung "like a canary", and dropped "a bombshell: he mentions a name. And not just any name, but the name of a very powerful cabinet minister.

        "I'm taken aback, then he names two more cabinet ministers. He threatens to open the whole can of worms.""
      • "Allen never stood trial - he was found dead, at the age of 37, with a bullet wound to his head, just like the 60-year-old Wiley.

        Both died within weeks of each other in 1987. Both had, according to the official police version, taken their lives."
      • "If it does turn out that Minne was killed, it would imply that hit men - loyal to the former regime - are still operating in South Africa."
    • Note that defense minister General Magnus Malan approved the creation of the Civil Cooperation Bureau (CCB), a Gladio-type death squad that killed numerous South Africans to preserve apartheid

Other curiosities

  • Unidentified Isdal Woman - likely a spy; it is hypothesized that Norwegian authorities were pressured to cover up her death as a suicide
    • Review of Isdalskvinnen: Operasjon Isotopsy by Tore Osland (2002) in the Norwegian Book Database (translated): "The book is based on an incident in Bergen in 1970, when a young woman was found dead under suspicious circumstances. The case has been published in the local newspapers for a number of years and is known as the Isdal case. Both Kripos, POT, the Armed Forces and embassies, Interpol, the Secret Service and the CIA were involved in the case. It has never been solved, the police have never succeeded in identifying the woman who had 9 different identities and passports. The novel is based on documentary material from the investigation and interviews with police officers and others who followed the case, parts of the investigation data are identical or to some extent compressed representations. The events are set in the dramatic major political conditions that unfolded in the present between East and West."
    • Bergensavisen, "A hiker met the Isdal woman", 2005/03/20 (translated): "It's dusk outside, about to get completely dark. He is near Brushytten when he sees a woman with strange features. Her face is completely distorted by anxiety. The woman is dressed to walk in the city and not in the mountains. As they pass each other, she shapes her mouth as if to say something, but is frightened by two men in coats who are rushing after her. The men look southern. The young man from Bergen is gripped by a great sense of danger. - Something cruel is happening on the mountain tonight, says the 26-year-old when he arrives at Bergenhus celebrities. The 26-year-old contacts an acquaintance in the police after the Isdal woman is found. He recognizes her in the drawings of the dead. 'Forget her, she was dispatched. The case will never be solved ", says the acquaintance in the police. The 26-year-old follows the advice. It will be 32 years before he publicly tells what he has seen."
    • BBC, "Isdal Woman: The mystery death haunting Norway for 46 years", 2017/05/13: "By now, there are several rumours that the woman was a spy. There weren't too many foreign tourists in Bergen then - and the fact the woman seemed wealthy, and well-travelled, sparked a lot of speculation. [...] Norwegian intelligence services are investigating too - but will not admit it until decades later. According to NRK, security services were interested in reports that the woman had been seen observing the military test out new rockets in western Norway - but there weren't any clear conclusions from their investigation reports. Police eventually crack some of the coded note - but it doesn't provide any evidence that she's a spy. Instead, it appears to be a record of the places the woman visited."
    • BBC podcast "Death in Ice Valley"