StB frontier trap mastermind dies

The man believed to be behind one of the communist era secret police’s most infamous actions, Evžen Abrahamovič, has died at the age of 92, Czech public television announced. Abrahamovič is believed to have masterminded the creation of false frontier posts to trick those escaping into US occupied Germany after 1948 into thinking they had already reached safety. He was charged by police last year. The frontier posts set up near the real border were staffed with StB officers who pretended to be from the US army and encouraged those fleeing communist Czechoslovakia to confess who helped them and their network of contacts. The so-called operation kamen (stone) was wound up from 1951 when frontier security was reinforced and escape became almost impossible.