ABSTRACT

Before traveling to Stockholm in April 1906 to attend the Fourth Party Congress, Koba stopped briefly at St Petersburg. He went to the Okhrana headquarters and offered to provide information about the congress. In line with standard procedures, the St Petersburg Okhrana reported Koba’s offer to the chief of the Okhrana Foreign Agency, Arkady Mikhailovich Garting, whose responsibility was to gather information on the activities of revolutionaries abroad. The Foreign Agency had very few personnel. It received support, in the form of agents sent from the St Petersburg or the Moscow Okhrana, only on important occasions, such as when the observation of a socialist congress or a conspiracy abroad required the strengthening of the services in western Europe.1 The Okhrana knew about the departure of the Social Democratic delegates for the Stockholm congress. The St Petersburg Okhrana saw in Koba’s offer the opportunity to send this informer to attend the congress and work with Garting.2 At this moment, Garting was very interested in information about the Stockholm congress. He arranged for an Okhrana officer to travel to Stockholm to escort Koba to a rendezvous with him. The officer and Koba agreed to travel to Stockholm separately to avoid being seen together, to meet there in the lobby of the Hotel Bristol, and from there to proceed to meet Garting.3