big question within the Security Police was to what extent personnel control would be given special authority to investigate foreign citizens residing in Sweden, or whether this would go on being the preserve of the Immigration Division.
Out of this somewhat esoteric bureaucratic debate, a need had arisen for the Section to assign a trusted colleague to the operation who could reinforce its control, espionage in fact, against members of the Immigration Division.
The job fell to a young man who had worked at S.I.S. since 1970, and whose background and political loyalty made him eminently qualified to work alongside the officers in the Section. In his free time he was a member of an organization called the Democratic Alliance, which was described by the social-democratic media as extreme right-wing. Within the Section this was no obstacle. Three others were members of the Democratic Alliance too, and the Section had in fact been instrumental in the very formation of the group. It had also contributed a small part of its funding. It was through this organization that the young man was brought to the attention of the Section and recruited.
His name was Gunnar Bjorck.
It was an improbable stroke of luck that when Alexander Zalachenko walked into Norrmalm police station on Election Day 1976 and requested asylum, it was a junior officer called Gunnar Bjorck who received him in his capacity as administrator of the Immigration Division. An agent already connected to the most secret of the secret.
Bjorck recognized Zalachenko's importance at once and broke off the interview to install the defector in a room at the Hotel Continental. It was Gullberg whom Bjorck notified when he sounded the alarm, and not his formal boss in the Immigration Division. The call came just as the voting booths had closed and all signs pointed to the fact that Palme was going to lose. Gullberg had just come home and was watching the election coverage on T.V. At first he was sceptical about the information that the excited young officer was telling him. Then he drove down to the Continental, not 250 metres from the hotel room where he found himself today, to assume control of the Zalachenko affair.
That night Gullberg's life underwent a radical change. The notion of secrecy took on a whole new dimension. He saw immediately the need to create a new structure around the defector.
He decided to include Bjorck in the Zalachenko unit. It was a reasonable decision, since Bjorck already knew of Zalachenko's existence. Better to have him on the inside than a security risk on the outside. Bjorck was moved from his post within the Immigration Division to a desk in the apartment in ostermalm.
In the drama that followed, Gullberg chose from the beginning to inform only one person in S.I.S., namely the head of Secretariat, who already had an overview of the activities of the Section. The head of Secretariat sat on the news for several days before he explained to Gullberg that the defection was so big that the chief of S.I.S. would have to be informed, as well as the government.
By that time the new chief of S.I.S. knew about the Section for Special Analysis, but he had only a vague idea of what the Section actually did. He had come on board recently to clean up the shambles of what was known as the Internal Bureau affair, and was already on his way to a higher position within the police hierarchy. The chief of S.I.S. had been told in a private conversation with the head of Secretariat that the Section was a secret unit appointed by the government. Its mandate put it outside regular operations, and no questions should be asked. Since this particular chief was a man who never asked questions that might yield unpleasant answers, he acquiesced. He accepted that there was something known only as S.S.A. and that he should have nothing more to do with the matter.
Gullberg was content to accept this situation. He issued instructions that required even the chief of S.I.S. not to discuss the topic in his office without taking special precautions. It was agreed that Zalachenko would be handled by the Section for Special Analysis.
The outgoing Prime Minister was certainly not to be informed. Because of the merry-go-round associated with a change of government, the incoming Prime Minister was fully occupied appointing ministers and negotiating with other conservative parties. It was not until a month after the government was formed that the chief of S.I.S., along with