Tass Confirms Execution of Accused Spy : Reported CIA Contact Turned In by Agency Defector Howard

A Soviet aviation expert accused of spying for the CIA has been executed for high treason, Tass press agency confirmed today. The Los Angeles Times reported earlier this year that the man was a prime CIA contact in Moscow and was turned in by agency defector Edward Lee Howard.

Adolf Tolkachev was sentenced to death by the military collegium of the Soviet Supreme Court, which “found him guilty of high treason in the form of spying,” Tass said.

The brief report gave no details of Tolkachev’s alleged espionage activities and did not say when the trial or execution occurred. The report came in the midst of a tit-for-tat series of diplomatic expulsions between Moscow and Washington.

Tass said an investigation showed that Tolkachev, “in pursuit of selfish ends and on account of his hostile attitude to the Soviet state, had maintained espionage contacts with U.S. intelligence agents who had been in Moscow under the guise of U.S. Embassy personnel.”

Death Reported Earlier

The Times, quoting unidentified sources, reported from Washington earlier this year that Tolkachev had been executed because of information disclosed by Howard.

Howard, 34, was fired by the CIA in 1983 after 2 1/2 years with the agency. The FBI alleges that he met with KGB agents in September, 1984, in Austria and sold them U.S. secrets for $6,000.

Howard disappeared in September, 1985, while under FBI surveillance, and surfaced in the Soviet Union last August. He was given political asylum after claiming that he was being persecuted by U.S. security forces.

Howard was the first CIA agent known to have defected to the Soviet Union.

Two days before Howard disappeared from his home in Santa Fe, N.M., the KGB issued an announcement through Tass saying that Tolkachev had been charged with espionage.

Linked With Diplomat

At the time, the KGB linked Tolkachev with U.S. diplomat Paul Stombaugh, who was expelled from the Soviet Union on espionage charges in June, 1985.

Tass today described Tolkachev as a staff worker of a Moscow research institute. News reports in the United States have said he was an engineer and had supplied information on aviation technology to the CIA for years.

The court, “considering the gravity of his crime, sentenced him to the exceptional measure of punishment--death,” Tass said.

It said an appeal was denied and “the sentence has been carried out.”