The passport of a STASI unofficial collaborator
The passport of a STASI unofficial collaborator
This is the passport was issued to Ulrich Makosch (born March 17, 1933, in Wittenberg, † May 16, 2008, in Berlin), a German journalist. He was a deputy editor-in-chief of the current camera and member of the SED district administration Berlin.
From 1965 to 1971, Makosch was the correspondent of broadcasting and television of the GDR in Asia, mainly in Jakarta and Singapore. During this time he wrote travelogues about Asian countries, e.g., about the coup in Indonesia and later of the Vietnam War. From 1972 to 1975 he was a deputy editor-in-chief for reports and documentation at the DFF, after which he was a deputy editor-in-chief of the Current Camera until 1990. Ulrich Makosch also moderated some issues of the political-agitational program The Black Channel. Since the 1950s he was a secret informer or unofficial employee observation of the GDR state security with the code name “Primus.” From 1978 to 1989 Makosch was a member of the SED district administration Berlin and from 1978 to 1990 President of the Friendship Society DDR Mozambique. In 1990, he retired. From 1990 to 1991 he worked for the American television company CNN. The passport of a STASI unofficial collaborator – Code name PRIMUS
From 1955 till 1956 he worked as an editor for the local radio station in Schwerin. He then, from 1956 till 1964, worked as an editor and travel correspondent for the country’s national broadcasting committee, a committee modeled on its Soviet equivalent that controlled the radio, and increasingly television broadcasting. From 1965 till 1971 Makosch worked as a chief foreign correspondent for the East German Television Corporation, focused on south-east Asia and based, for much of the time, in Djakarta and Singapore. He also wrote reports about the region, notably about the 1965 putsch in Indonesia and, later, about the Vietnam War, and published numerous books on these and related topics. From 1972 till 1975 he was deputy chief editor for reportage and documentary with the television company, after which, for fifteen years till 1990, he was deputy chief editor of the long-running news program (viewed in some quarters as a “propaganda tool”) Aktuelle Kamera. For many years he also fronted Objektiv, a weekly political television program focused on foreign policy concerns and issues. In 1990/1991 he worked for CNN.
From 1978 till 1989 he served as a member of the Berlin district party leadership. He served on the GDR-Mozambique Friendship Committee between 1978 and 1990. He became also a volunteer member of the Society for the Protection of Civil Rights and Human Values, an organization established following German reunification by members of the former East German establishment, including lawyers, scientists and State Security officers/collaborators in response to concerns that they might face gratuitous hostility or injustice because of things alleged to have happened under the old East German regime.
After 1990 it transpired that he had served the Ministry for State Security since the 1950s as a secret informer, recorded in the Stasi files from 1969 under the code name “IMB Primus”.
Tom Topol | Passport History Expert & Author.
Featured in media incl. CNN, BBC, Newsweek. Awarded by the U.S. Department of State.
"Want to go deeper? My book Let Pass or Die covers the full 400-year history"
👉 Ask Me Anything | 🏛️ View the Recognition List | 📚 Rare offers from my personal collection
