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RAOUL WALLENBERG WAS PRISONER NR 7 !!!

    Dear Mrs. von Dardel, dear Marie and Louise,

    We are writing to you to share the information enclosed below. As you know, over the last few years, we have continued an often slow but productive exchange with the archives of the Federal Security Services of the Russian Federation (FSB). The latest round of discussions, in November 2009, have yielded a resounding surprise. In a formal reply to several questions regarding Russian prison interrogation registers from 1947, FSB archivists stated that « with great likelihood » Raoul Wallenberg became « Prisoner No. 7″ in Moscow’s Lubyanka prison some time that year. The archivists added that “Prisoner No. 7” had been interrogated on July 23, 1947 which – if confirmed – would mean that the Soviet era claims of Wallenberg’s death on July 17, 1947 are no longer valid. Never before have Russian officials stated the possibility of Raoul Wallenberg’s survival past this date so explicitly.

    The Swedish Ambassador, Tomas Bertelman, and his staff responded quickly to the new information. In a letter addressed to Yuri Trambitsky, head of the FSB’s Central Archive, dated December 9, 2009, Bertelman asked Mr. Trambitsky for clarification, writing that “if this hypothesis is confirmed, it will be . . . almost sensational.”

    We have also sent a detailed follow-up request to FSB officials, asking for more precise information about “Prisoner No. 7,” including procedural details pertaining to the assignment of numbers to prisoners under investigation, as well as possible steps to be taken to verify “Prisoner No. 7’s” identity and his fate after July 23, 1947. So far, Russian officials have not presented any additional information for their claim that “Prisoner No. 7” could be identical with Raoul Wallenberg.

    We stress that an in-depth verification of the new information has to take place before any final conclusions can be drawn, but if indeed confirmed, the news is the most interesting to come out of Russian archives in over fifty years.