Wallenberg Killed in Kremlin Jail, Soviet Aide Hints

A Soviet official on Thursday came close to saying that Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg, who saved thousands of Jews from concentration camps during World War II, had been killed in Soviet custody.

Soviet diplomat Yuri Kashlev told a news conference at a Paris human rights meeting that Wallenberg’s disappearance and death was “a dark page in Soviet history.”

Rumors that Wallenberg is still alive in the Soviet Union are false, Kashlev said.

Wallenberg disappeared in 1945 after being arrested by Soviet troops in Eastern Europe. Sweden has never accepted Soviet explanations that he died of a heart attack in prison in 1947 at the age of 34.

Kashlev, replying to questions from human rights organizations, said, “The people who destroyed people like Wallenberg also destroyed all documents concerning him. . . . We deeply regret the death of this noble man. . . .”