DOCUMENT
55
Statement
of Irena Kun (Bela Kun’s sister) about Georg Benedek.
STATEMENT[i]
On
29 August, Georg Benedek[ii]
(residing: Moscow, Starosadsky per[eulok], [dom] 4, kv[artira] 59) called me on
the phone and, his voice trembling, said that he had something to tell me, but
had “no heart to do it at that moment.” Then he hung up. An hour later, he
called again and said the following: “A great misfortune has happened, I have
committed a crime against you, I have compromised you, but I still have no
heart to tell you.” When he called me again an hour and a half later, he told
me the following. Several months ago he started to record facts that could
compromise me. Thus, in April, he made a note of seeing me talking in the
doorway to a certain Trotskyist. He asked a girl, who had stepped inside the
doorway to get out of the rain, to sign that note.
Benedek
explained to the girl that he needed that note as evidence for divorce
purposes. After that, according to Benedek, he recorded another case. Once,
after he had read me one of Stalin’s speeches, I supposedly wondered about
Trotsky’s opinion on the peasant question. Benedek put all this on paper and
hid it among his books. At that point, I asked him what his motive was. He
replied: “I myself have no idea. I did not intend to hurt you. I wanted to use
these materials later, but not against you.” “Against whom?” I asked. “You must
have [already] guessed,” he replied. When I repeated my question, against
whom?, he said nothing. He reiterated, however, that someone had stolen his
note recently, that it was missing from among the books where he had left it.
“The person who stole the note,” he continued, “evidently has already submitted
it. (He did not specify to whom, but implied that he meant the NKVD). He,
Benedek, had already been interrogated twice, and they would interrogate me, he
declared. I said “fine,” and hung up.
The
30th of August was a weekend, so I could do nothing. On the 31st,
I went to our party secretary, c. Stoianov,[iii]
and told him everything about this affair. I also went to M. Ya. Frumkina and
told her everything. At 2 PM, Benedek approached me at the tram stop with the
words: “I don’t know what I have done to you, but I have certainly messed up my
VKP(b) re-registration.” I did not answer, but he continued, very agitated:
“You know, don’t tell your brother about all this, you may run into trouble.
Anyway, there is a struggle going on in my mind. I don’t know what will happen
to me, but I’d like to be 10,000 miles away from here.” I asked: “Why did you
do it, what was the purpose?” This time his reply was explicit and cynical: “I
did it because I already know you and your brother. I wanted to show this note
to your brother, since at one of the meetings, he called on us to be vigilant.
I planned to demonstrate my vigilance and see what he would say when he sees
this record of a conversation by his sister.” I said: “But you yourself admit
that whatever is in it is not correct, it is a lie.” He responded: “I am not
saying that it’s incorrect any more, and I advise you, too, to confess that the
note’s contents are accurate. You kept repeating “yes, yes, I am listening”
over the phone. Thus, you have admitted everything. Don’t think that I alone
heard you. There were witnesses who heard you saying “yes, yes.”
I
could not stand that any longer and went to the district NKVD department where
I declared what had happened.
I
have known Benedek for 3 years, we live in the same building. He studied at the
VKU where I was working. I always knew that he was mentally unsound. But I
would never have suspected him of being so mean until, according to his own
words, c. Bela Kun refused to give him a recommendation to the KUNMZ graduate
school in June-August 1935. After that, he started telling me and c. E. Nagy[iv]
things that aroused my suspicions that Benedek was either crazy or an agent
provocateur.
Of
all that he wrote down (and told me) only one thing corresponds to the facts. I
have known Lazutov[v] since the
session of a board of which we were members. In April 1936, I was standing in
the doorway waiting for the rain to stop, since I planned to go shopping.
Lazutov walked in and asked me how I was feeling. I answered: “Good.” He
started lamenting: “Your life is good, and mine is bad. I was expelled from the
party, removed from job. Comrades said that I was a Trotskyist, but I am as
pure as gold.” I said that, if he believed himself to be innocent, and if
comrades had indeed slandered him, he should appeal. The party does not expel
useful and needed members.
He
wanted to add something but, seeing that I started reading a newspaper, he
left. He extended his hand to me but I pretended not to see him. This is all.
I
know nothing more about Lazutov. Neither he nor I have [ever] visited each
other.
Irena
Kun.
2/IX-1936.
RGASPI, f. 495, op. 199, d. 977, ll.
2-2ob.
Original in Russian. Typewritten.
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[i] The statement by Irena Kun was probably sent to the ECCI’s Cadres Department. The document is a typewritten copy. The author’s style is retained unaltered.
[ii] Georg Benedek. Born in 1898, he was a member of the CPH between 1919-1935. In 1926, he was a member of the CP of Austria, and in 1927-1932, a member of the CPFr (its Hungarian section). In 1932, he went to the USSR with the permission of the CPFr’s Hungarian section. Between 1932 and 1937, he worked in the 1st Shoe Factory in Moscow. In August 1936, he wrote a statement to the CC VKP (Andreev’s Secretariat) about Irena and Bela Kun that was forwarded to the NKVD. On 27 January 1937, Benedek wrote a letter to Dimitrov asking to receive him so that he could convey certain facts regarding Bela Kun.
[iii] Stoianov – no information available.
[iv] Endre Nagy. Born in 1884 in Tashpad, Hungary. During WWI, he was a prisoner of war in Russia and participated in the POW movement. In 1918, he joined the CPH. Between March and August 1919, he was a collegium member in the People’s Commissariat for Education of the Hungarian Soviet Republic. After the fall of the Hungarian Soviet Republic, he was arrested and imprisoned from September 1919 to October 1920. After his release, he went to Czechoslovakia. In 1928, he was exiled from the country and, with the approval of the CC CPH, emigrated to the USSR. Between 1933 and 1936, he taught in the German sector of the KUNMZ. In February 1937, he was arrested.
[v] Lazutov – no information is available.