Norwegian spy Arne Treholt died in Moscow

At the age of 80, Arne Treholt, a former employee of the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, convicted in his homeland for espionage in favor of the Soviet Union, died in Moscow, AP reports. In Norway, the Treholt case was the largest espionage scandal of the Cold War era.

In 1985, Treholt was sentenced to 20 years. During the trial, it was discovered that for nine years he had been passing plans for the defense industry of Norway and NATO, as well as confidential political information, to curators from the USSR. In addition, Treholt transmitted data to Iraq. At the trial, the accused admitted that he met with KGB employees and took money from them for services as a "business consultant". Later, he wrote several books in which he claimed that he was not a spy, and unsuccessfully tried to get his case reviewed in Norway. In 1992, he was pardoned for health reasons, he left Norway and has since lived in Cyprus and Moscow.

The Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten, which reported Treholt's death after a short illness, reported that he was survived by a son and two grandchildren. Rossiyskaya Gazeta responded to the death in this way: "He died in Moscow in the Botkin hospital. Until the last months, he heroically fought for his life. Asthma was suffocating, which began to develop in a Norwegian prison, he was tormented by kidney pain, and he was jogging, kept up a cheerful spirit by charging, did not lose optimism".

In 2010, Novye Izvestia wrote about the mysteries of the Treholt case.