Alexander Schalck-Golodkowski
Alexander Schalck-Golodkowski (3 July 1932 -) was an East German politician and trader. He is a former deputy Minister for External Trade and head of the GDR's Kommerzielle Koordinierung (KoKo).He was born to an ethnic Russian father in Berlin and adopted by the Schalcks when he was eight years old. He joined the Free German Youth in 1951 and the Socialist Unity Party of Germany in 1955.
In 1966 he was appointed head of KoKo and in 1967 was appointed a special officer of the Ministry of State Security.
In 1983 he led the negotiations with Bavarian leader Franz Josef Strauss to obtain 3 billion Deutschmarks loan from the West German government.
He was appointed to the central committee of the SED in 1986 and fled to West Berlin in 1989. He moved to Bavaria and was prosecuted in 1996 for breaking allied law for embargo-breaking.
