Ivan Ivanovich Agayants was a leading Soviet NKVD/KGB intelligence officer of Armenian origin.
Born the son of Hovhanes Agayants, priest of the Armenian Apostolic Church, in the town of Elizavetpol, in modern-day Azerbaijan on 28 August 1911, he followed two elder brothers into the secret police.
In 1930, he moved to Moscow to begin work in the OGPU economic department.
During his lifetime he was given many awards by the Soviet government, including the Order of Lenin, and his name is engraved in gold on the wall of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service headquarters in Moscow among the seventy or so leading intelligence officers.
by Mano Chil
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