Canadians Gleaned Naval Intelligence From Russian Defector, Newly Released Files Show

Canadians Gleaned Naval Intelligence From Russian Defector, Newly Released Files Show
Pages from the RCMP file on defector Sergei Kourdakov, a Russian seaman who turned up bloody and exhausted on the British Columbia coast in September 1971 are photographed in Ottawa on Dec. 21, 2022. The Canadian Press/Jim Bronskill
The Canadian Press
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The young Russian seaman who turned up exhausted and bleeding on the British Columbia shore struck a Canadian intelligence official as well mannered, sincere and athletic, built like Tarzan of the movies.

Less than two years later, defector Sergei Kourdakov would die in a California motel room—apparently by accidentally shooting himself—after joining an evangelical Christian group dedicated to smuggling Bibles behind the Iron Curtain.