Details Friday, 23 November 2018 18:00 Estonian Life No. 47 2018 - Laas Leivat

According to Eduard Vallaste, of New York, a long-time member of the Estonian World Council and with reliable contacts in Soviet-occupied Estonia, Tuldava-Haman underwent special training at an intelligence school in Riga during 1952-1955. His ‘defection’ to the West took some years to execute in that Western intelligence services were wary of defectors arriving in the post-war years.While in Riga he often visited the sea port at Ventspils, tasked with attempting to befriend sailors on Western ships. Via these contacts he was able to send 12 letters to Swedish, English and US intelligence services. In the letters, he posed as an anti-Soviet resistance activist proposing they send their agents by ship to Ventspils. The plan was to exchange identities with a Western agent similar in appearance to Tuldava-Haman who would then leave for the West as the seaman. With every letter he included a photo of himself. Although all letters reached their intended destination, they remained unanswered. His insistence and accurate knowledge of the Western agencies’ addresses aroused the vigilance of the recipients.The failure of sending their own man to the West aided by Western intelligence services meant fiding a new route to the West, namely through Finland to Sweden. IN October 1955 Tuldava-Haman, after receiving final instructions in Leningrad left by truck and bus to the border town of Viipuri (Wyborg), where he stayed with Soviet agent ‘Oskar S-I’, who hid him behind some wood building supplies on a train to Porkkala. Before Porkkala he jumped from the train and made his way to Helsinki. There, claiming to be a political refugee, he contacted local Estonians who then were able to help him over the border to Sweden. (Pikemalt, Toronto