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Last KGB chief Bakatin dies aged 85

Vadim Bakatin was a candidate in the 1991 Russian presidential election that resulted in the victory of Boris Yeltsin

MOSCOW, August 1. /TASS/. Vadim Bakatin, the last chairman of the Soviet Union’s Committee for State Security (KGB) has died in Moscow aged 85, the head of the Officers of Russia public organization told TASS on Monday.

"The last KGB chairman, Vadim Bakatin, has died. I met him twice when I worked at the Moscow department of the KGB," Alexander Mikhailov said.

He said that names of the KGB agents had been declassified under Bakatin who was the one to reveal the project to install covert listening devices in the US embassy building in Moscow.

"Under Bakatin the names of KGB agents were declassified, secret and confidential materials were made public, many lives were ruined, principles of secret service work were broken and our allies were betrayed," Mikhailov said.

Bakatin was born in 1937. He served as the Soviet Union’s interior minister between 1988 and 1990 and then was made the last chairman of the KGB. Bakatin was a candidate in the 1991 Russian presidential election that resulted in the victory of Boris Yeltsin.

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