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Juergen Fuchs

Jürgen Fuchs

References

  • Fuchs, J.: Gedächtnisprotokolle (1977)
  • Fuchs, J.: Vernehmungsprotokolle (1978)
  • Fuchs, J.: Magdalena (1999)
  • Scheer, Udo: Jürgen Fuchs. Ein literarischer Weg in die Opposition. Herausgegeben von der Stiftung Gedenkstätte Berlin-Hohenschönhausen. (2007)

Born in 1950, the writer and psychologist Jürgen Fuchs was subjected to the Ministry of State Security's "operative" treatment from the time he was twenty. In 1975, he was expelled from the governing Socialist Unity Party (SED) and simultaneously, steps were taken to ex-matriculate him from the University of Jena. Together with his wife and newly-born daughter, Fuchs moved into the summer house of regime critic Robert Havemann. After protesting singer-songwriter Wolf Biermann's forced expatriation and deportation in November 1976, Fuchs was stopped on his way to the East Berlin offices of the "Spiegel" magazine and arrested.

He was then taken to the main Ministry of State Security (MfS) remand prison in Berlin-Hohenschönhausen. He later described the interrogation, which lasted several months, in his book “Vernehmungsprotokolle” (Interrogation Record). Finally, in August 1977, he was expatriated and deported to West Berlin. He lived there until the collapse of the SED regime, providing whatever support he could for the burgeoning GDR opposition. Despite living in West Berlin, he remained under MfS surveillance for years and was subjected to their "demoralisation measures." He died of leukaemia in 1999 and believed the Ministry of State Security (MfS) might well have secretly arranged his exposure to radioactive substances to cause the disease.