Combe–Ivanov Affair
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The Combe–Ivanov affair was an Australian political scandal of 1983. A Soviet diplomat and
KGB The Committee for State Security (, ), abbreviated as KGB (, ; ) was the main security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. It was the direct successor of preceding Soviet secret police agencies including the Cheka, Joint State Polit ...
spy,
Valery Ivanov Valery Nikolayevich Ivanov () (born 1948) was a Soviet diplomat. As First Secretary of the Soviet Embassy to Australia, he was expelled on 22 April 1983 under suspicion of being a spy after allegedly trying to recruit Australian Labor Party ...
, was expelled after he was found to have compromised a senior
Australian Labor Party The Australian Labor Party (ALP), also known as the Labor Party or simply Labor, is the major Centre-left politics, centre-left List of political parties in Australia, political party in Australia and one of two Major party, major parties in Po ...
(ALP) figure, David Combe. The affair also claimed the political scalp of a minister,
Mick Young Michael Jerome Young (9 October 1936 − 8 April 1996) was an Australian politician. He rose through the Australian Labor Party (ALP) to become its National Secretary, before serving as a Labor member of the House of Representatives from the ...
, and resulted in a Royal Commission being established under Justice Robert Hope to review Australia's security and intelligence agencies.


The affair

In 1983, David Combe, lobbyist and former National Secretary of the
Australian Labor Party The Australian Labor Party (ALP), also known as the Labor Party or simply Labor, is the major Centre-left politics, centre-left List of political parties in Australia, political party in Australia and one of two Major party, major parties in Po ...
(ALP), was accused of compromising Australia's national security in dealings with a Soviet diplomat,
Valery Ivanov Valery Nikolayevich Ivanov () (born 1948) was a Soviet diplomat. As First Secretary of the Soviet Embassy to Australia, he was expelled on 22 April 1983 under suspicion of being a spy after allegedly trying to recruit Australian Labor Party ...
.Blesing, Meena. ''Was Your Dad a Russian Spy? The Personal Story of the Combe/Ivanov Affair.'' Sun Books, 1986.
The National Library of Australi
catalogue entry
states: "by David Combe's wife, Meena Blesing".
Milliken R

'' The Independent, London, 1 August 1995
Cain, Frank ''The Australian Security Intelligence Organization: An Unofficial History'', Abingdon: Frank Cass & Co Ltd 1994 . Preview a
Google books
Of particular relevance, Ch. 10
ASIO in the 1980s
pp223-252;
"Australian-Soviet Trade" pp.227–228,
"The Third Man – Lawrence Matheson" pp228-230 and
"The Rise and Fall of David Combe" pp230-234.
The rest of the chapter discusses "ASIO and the Combe-Ivanov affair" and "Justice Hope's Royal Commission".
The so-called Combe–Ivanov affair developed out of a trip Combe and his wife made to the USSR in 1982, in the course of preparations for which they met and developed a relationship with Valery Ivanov, then the First Secretary at the Soviet Embassy in
Canberra Canberra ( ; ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the Federation of Australia, federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's list of cities in Australia, largest in ...
. Soon after the formation of the Hawke government in March 1983, the
Australian Security Intelligence Organisation The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO ) is the Intelligence agency, domestic intelligence and national security agency of the Australian Government, responsible for protection from espionage, sabotage, acts of foreign inte ...
(ASIO) raised concerns that Combe, still closely aligned to the ALP, might be being compromised by a Soviet citizen with KGB links. Ivanov was expelled from Australia on 22 April 1983 by Prime Minister Bob Hawke. Ministers were also directed not to use Combe's lobbying services, although the reason for this was not made known to them at the time. On 17 May, Justice Robert Hope was commissioned to investigate the affair but also to review the general progress of the intelligence agencies he had inquired into in 1974-77 at the behest of
Gough Whitlam Edward Gough Whitlam (11 July 191621 October 2014) was the 21st prime minister of Australia, serving from December 1972 to November 1975. To date the longest-serving federal leader of the Australian Labor Party (ALP), he was notable for being ...
(his first reports were handed down in 1975, during
Malcolm Fraser John Malcolm Fraser (; 21 May 1930 – 20 March 2015) was an Australian politician who served as the 22nd prime minister of Australia from 1975 to 1983. He held office as the leader of the Liberal Party of Australia, and is the fourth List of ...
's premiership).
Mick Young Michael Jerome Young (9 October 1936 − 8 April 1996) was an Australian politician. He rose through the Australian Labor Party (ALP) to become its National Secretary, before serving as a Labor member of the House of Representatives from the ...
, the Special Minister of State and Vice-President of the Executive Council (and himself a former ALP National Secretary 1969-72), was forced to stand down from the Ministry on 14 July when it was revealed he had breached Cabinet security, having talked to a journalist immediately after the 21 April Cabinet decision to expel Ivanov. In December 1983, Justice Hope reported that David Combe had indeed been targeted by the Soviets, but there was no proof of intelligence breaches or of any threat to national security;Pryor, Geoff

National Library of Australia, retrieved 1 July 2015.
and that with Ivanov’s expulsion there was no longer any reason to limit Combe’s access to ministers. Cabinet decided to set up a register of lobbyists. Registration would be voluntary, but unregistered lobbyists would have no access to ministers or officials.National Archives of Australia
. Retrieved 6 January 2019 Mick Young returned to the Cabinet in January 1984. Combe was later appointed Australian Trade Commissioner to Canada and Hong Kong.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Combe-Ivanov affair Combe–Ivanov affair, 1983 in Australia Political scandals in Australia Espionage scandals and incidents in Australia Australia–Soviet Union relations