Royal Commission on Espionage - Exhibit 198: Envelope containing small brown diary for year 1949 belonging to V Divisek

© Copyright National Archives of Australia

Royal Commission on Espionage - Exhibit 198: Envelope containing small brown diary for year 1949 belonging to V Divisek recording date and place of proposed meetings, with four sets of photographs (N/D/298) of sealed pages Function and purpose This series consists of exhibits and documents marked for identification numbered 1 – 521 tendered before the Royal Commission on Espionage. Soviet diplomat Vladimir Mikhailovich Petrov defected to Australia in April 1954. Employed as Third Secretary in the Soviet embassy at Canberra, Petrov was covertly the ‘Resident’ of the Soviet Ministry of State Security (then the ‘MGB’ but referred to as the ‘MVD” by the Royal Commission). At the time of his defection, Petrov gave the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) a bundle of documents he had access to as MVD Resident. A Royal Commission, the Royal Commission on Espionage (RCE), was subsequently empowered to investigate the information supplied by Petrov, particularly the nature and extent of Soviet espionage in Australia, and the involvement of Australians in it. The Royal Commission eventually held that the documents provided genuine proof of Soviet espionage, and how Australians had wittingly and unwittingly assisted it.