The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB

The Interrogation of Yuri Orlov on December 29, 1977 According to official announcements in Moscow, Fifth Directorate interrogation records of the interrogation of dissidents have been destroyed. Mitrokhin's copy may therefore be the only surviving transcript of Orlov's interrogation. A copy was sent by the Fifth Directorate to the FCD to form part of the dossier being used to prepare active measures to discredit Orlov in the West and prevent him receiving the Nobel Peace Prize. Mitrokhin's growing sympathy for the dissidents is reflected in the fact that he copied the whole of this and some other documents dealing with their persecution, rather than following his usual practice of copying extracts, making notes or writing précis.

The interrogation was conducted by Captain Yakovlev, senior investigator for especially important cases with the investigation department of the KGB Directorate for Moscow and Moscow Oblast under the USSR Council of Ministers, assisted by Assistant Procurator Chistyakov of Moscow City:

QUESTION: You have been shown the resolution dated December 29,1977 summoning you as the accused in criminal case No. 474, charged with committing a crime specified in Section 1 of Article 70 of the RSFSR Criminal Code.

Do you understand the nature of the charge?

ORLOV: No, it is not clear to me. I have not been shown evidence that my actions had the intention of undermining or weakening the Soviet regime, or any other evidence; instead of which, as I see it, the charge presented to me contains emotional phrases which obscure the nature of the case.

QUESTION: Do you admit you are guilty of the charge?

ORLOV: No, I do not. I do not see any proof of my guilt; I do not feel guilty, in my own conscience.

QUESTION: Do you admit the facts of preparing, duplicating and disseminating the documents specified in the charge against you?

ORLOV: Since these documents are qualified as deliberately slanderous fabrications, uttered with the intention of undermining or weakening the Soviet regime, I refuse to answer your question.

QUESNON: The investigation has established that you were a direct participant in the preparation, duplication and dissemination of the documents cited in the charge, and in a number of cases you were their author. The contents of these documents, as the materials of the case show, are of a slanderous nature, defaming the Soviet State and social order. What can you say about that?

ORLOV: In answer to that question, I should like to say the same thing as I have said in answer to the previous question, namely that I do not see any evidence, and do not feel guilty in my own conscience.

QUESTION: It has also been established that you acted deliberately to undermine and weaken the Soviet regime. What do you have to say about that?

ORLOV: I do not believe that this has been established. I rely on my own inner conviction, on my experience and on my thoughts.

QUESTION: Do you believe that the imperialist States and their agencies, to which you addressed the majority of the documents which incriminate you, are not interested in

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