Russia court rejects family bid for files on vanished diplomat Wallenberg

A Russian court rejects a bid by the descendants of Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg to force the FSB security service to release details on his death in a Soviet jail.

This undated handout photo from Pressens Bild shows Swedish diplomat and World War II hero Raoul Wallenberg. (Pressens Bild /AP, File)

Wallenberg used his diplomatic powers to help thousands of Jews flee Nazi-controlled Hungary during World War II and has been compared to Germany’s Oskar Schindler. After the Soviets entered Budapest just before the end of the war, Wallenberg was detained and jailed in the notorious headquarters of the secret police in Moscow, where he is believed to have died.

Wallenberg’s niece Marie Dupuy in July launched a legal case against the FSB — the successor of the Soviet-era KGB and NKVD spy agencies — to force it to drop its refusal to release the full archive on the diplomat.

But after a one-day hearing in Moscow, a judge at the Meshchansky district court ruled in favor of FSB and decided to reject the plea to release the full archives.

— AFP