Stasi Informer Passport: Code Name PRIMUS
The passport of a STASI unofficial collaborator
Who Was Ulrich Makosch?
Ulrich Makosch (born March 17, 1933, in Wittenberg; died May 16, 2008, in Berlin) was a prominent East German journalist and television editor. He rose to become deputy editor-in-chief of the GDR’s flagship news broadcast, Aktuelle Kamera, a program widely regarded as a state propaganda tool. What the public did not know for decades was that he had been a Stasi secret informer since the 1950s, operating under the code name “IMB Primus.”
A Career Built Inside the East German Media Apparatus
From 1955 to 1956, Makosch worked as an editor at the local radio station in Schwerin. He then joined the national broadcasting committee from 1956 to 1964, an institution modeled on its Soviet equivalent that controlled all radio and television output in the GDR.
Between 1965 and 1971, he served as chief foreign correspondent for the East German Television Corporation (DFF), based primarily in Jakarta and Singapore. From that post, he reported on the 1965 coup in Indonesia and on the Vietnam War, later publishing multiple books on Southeast Asian affairs.
From 1972 to 1975, he was deputy chief editor for reportage and documentary at DFF. He then spent fifteen years, until 1990, as deputy chief editor of Aktuelle Kamera. He also fronted Objektiv, a weekly television program focused on foreign policy. After reunification, he briefly worked for CNN in 1990 and 1991.
Political Roles and Party Membership
Makosch was a member of the SED (Socialist Unity Party) district administration in Berlin from 1978 to 1989. Between 1978 and 1990, he served as President of the GDR-Mozambique Friendship Society. After German reunification, he also joined the Society for the Protection of Civil Rights and Human Values, an organization founded by former East German officials, lawyers, and Stasi collaborators who feared reprisals after die Wende.
Exposed: Stasi Informer Code Name PRIMUS
After 1990, the opening of the Stasi Records Agency revealed that Makosch had served the Ministry for State Security as a secret informer since the 1950s. His file, recorded from 1969 onward, carries the designation “IMB Primus.” He was classified as an inoffizieller Mitarbeiter, the Stasi’s term for an unofficial collaborator embedded in civilian life.
The Passport
The passport shown here was issued to Makosch and dates to the late 1950s. It is a rare surviving document connected directly to a confirmed Stasi informer. The passport was in use during the period when Makosch was already reporting covertly to the Ministry for State Security, making it a primary source artifact of Cold War surveillance history.
Tom Topol | Passport Historian & Author
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