The Soviet Union recently asked Israel to free Shabtai Kalmanovitz, an Israeli businessman sentenced three years ago by the Tel Aviv District Court for spying for the Soviet Union, the Israeli daily Yediot Achronot reported Thursday.
Kalmanovitz, 46, is currently serving a nine year prison term. His 1988 trial was held behind closed doors.
In exchange for allowing Kalmanovitz to return to the USSR, the Soviets offered to assist Israel in humanitarian issues.
According to Yediot, an Israeli academician doing research work in Moscow was told of the request by someone from the Soviet Academy of Sciences.
Sources in Israel have confirmed the information, the paper said.
Kalmanovitz immigrated to Israel in 1971. After briefly working in the Labor Party and in the Prime Minister’s Information Service, he became an aide to businessman Shmuel Flatto- Sharon.
Flatto-Sharon, a member of Knesset in the late 1970s, was himself sentenced to a three-month jail term in Israel for buying votes and to 10 years in a French prison for embezzlement.
Kalmanovitz was arrested in December 1987 when he returned to Israel on a flight from London. He was subsequently charged with spying for the Soviet Union.
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