De Swaan looks at his BVD file and is not happy

Abram de Swan, honorary lecturer in sociology, took a look at the archive that the Homeland Security Service (BVD), the predecessor to the current AIVD, has created about him. For years it was wrongly monitored. Other intellectuals in the capital and the Dutch Auschwitz Committee were also followed during the Cold War.

Castro

De Swan (82 years old) visited the National Archives to view his personal file. Het Parole went with him. He was editor for forty years Guide And the paper Propria treatments. to Free people He interviewed socialist dictator Fidel Castro in Cuba. A picture of him with the Comandante appeared on the front page of the newspaper. The BVD learned through an informant that this picture also hung in De Swaan's living room.

Writers, artists, scientists, and journalists were censored during the Cold War for their left-wing sympathies. Their ideas were considered a potential danger to democratic society. Since November 2022, people have been able to view their profile in the National Archives. De Swaan wanted BVD members to ring the doorbell for him and the others for a cup of coffee. “Then you get a better impression.”

Chili pepper

A dossier has also been created about De Swan's cousin Salomon from Chile. “Sally was the son of one of my father’s brothers, who immigrated to Chile before World War II,” De Swan says. “He then went to Mexico, where he was arrested during student demonstrations in 1968 and was severely beaten.” Salomon's visa application ended up in De Swan's file. “In Mexico he was a leftist, so he must have been skeptical to the Americans,” the sociologist said. Hit Parole.

In 1969, de Swan was described in the file as a “progressive saloon man” who liked “dessert trips”, “although perhaps not as much as Jan Kramer”. “This is very much the commitment of the snobby,” she says. Once, the snobby appeal tempted Ramna to marry the daughter of Ank van der Moer and Gus Ooster. Of course that didn’t work out. “It reeks of envy,” De Swaan told the newspaper, “and the spy thinks it’s not He is under surveillance and is not shy about his resentment towards the BVD. “And now, after all this time, it has suddenly become public. “I find that very funny.”

Go hide

De Swaan's father is also discussed in the file. This hurt him. They had to hide in the crematorium and then the intelligence services followed them. Mick de Swan (1911) was associated with the left-wing newspaper Resistance Free platform With his wealth, he later supported leftist artists. “Oh, that's him, with his shocked face,” De Swan says of his father's passport photo. His parents' group of friends is described in detail.

After the war, there were many complicated love relationships, but the friendship bonds of resistance and hiding remained preserved. “It makes me sad,” De Swaan says of this part of the file. His father, Mick de Swan, died in an airplane accident in March 1957. In 2024, his son reads that a BVD informant was at his father's funeral. The report mentions who carried the coffin.