YEREVAN, JANUARY 10, ARMENPRESS:

Armenian intelligence agent, hero of the Soviet Union Gevorg Vartanian passed away hours ago in Botkin Hospital, Moscow. Journalist Gurgen Khazhakyan told Armenpress that the cancer was the cause of his death.

Gevorg Vartanian is the only intelligence agent of the soviet foreign intelligence service, who has been awarded with the Hero of the Soviet Union Medal when he was still alive. His name is listed among the best 100 intelligence agents of all times and peoples. Gevorg Vartanian was born February 17, 1924 in Nor Nakhichevan (currently Rostov-on-Don). His father was a Soviet intelligence agent as well and was sent to Persia (presently Iran) on 1930, where he worked for 23 years under a cover of a wealthy merchant. Gevork Vartanian was not even 16 when he went into intelligence. In 1955, he graduated from the Institute of Foreign Languages, Yerevan. He is primarily responsible for thwarting Operation Long Jump, concocted byAdolf Hitler, headed by Ernst Kaltenbrunner, and led by Otto Skorzeny, which was an attempt to assassinate Stalin,Churchill, and Roosevelt at the Tehran conference in 1943.

In 1942, Adolf Hitler decided to set the operation in motion. After careful planning and deliberation under the personal supervision of Security Police Chief Ernst Kaltenbrunner, Hitler sent his special commando agent, Otto Skorzeny, along with six other men to rendezvous at Tehran,Iran and spearhead the operation. The plan entailed the capture and/or assassination of Josef Stalin, Winston Churchill, and Franklin Roosevelt.

The first tip-off about the planned attempt came from Soviet intelligence agent Nikolai Kuznetsov, under the alias of Wermacht Oberleutnant Paul Siebert, from Nazi-occupied Ukraine. Kuznetsov got a drunk SS officer named Ulrich von Ortel to tell him about the attempt. Although the scheduled date of the operation was not known, the fact that it would take place was confirmed.

According to Vartanian, he had been assigned to recruit agents beginning in 1940. He and his seven recruits had identified Nazi spies. However, in the autumn of 1943, they were given a different task, security for the upcoming conference. Six German radio operators had been sent to Tehran as an advance team for the assassination. Eventually, Vartanian and his men managed to find where the commando unit was hiding.

From then on, the radio messages to Berlin were intercepted by Soviet and British intelligence. However, one of the Germans managed to send a coded message "we are under surveillance". The operation was getting off track and the main group led by Skorzeny never went to Tehran.

Gevorg Vartanian has met with Churchill's granddaughter and been congratulated for his great service to the Allies. It was revealed that his identity was kept secret until the year 2000, when he finally received full credit for putting a stop to the assassination plot.