Jakob Rudnik

Who was Jakob Rudnik?

Jakob Rudnik was a Ukrainian-born agent for the Otdel Mezhdunarodny Sviasy, the Communist International's clandestine International Liaison Department. He rose to notoriety in 1931 under the nom de guerre Hilaire Noulens when he was arrested in Shanghai along with his wife Tatiana Moissenko by the Special Branch of the Shanghai Municipal Police. For almost 60 years, the identity of Noulens was incorrectly thought to be Paul Ruegg. Thus, in the few works that deal with the arrest of Rudnik and his wife on 15 June 1931, this mistake is common. It was only in an article by Dr. Frederick Litten in the China Quarterly in 1994 that Noulens' real identity was exposed.

As a result of the actions of the propagandist Willi Münzenberg an international press furore was generated about the case. Celebrities such as Albert Einstein, H.G. Wells, Madame Sun Yat-sen, and Henri Barbusse became involved in the International Noulens/Ruegg Defence Committee that was established and the case was discussed in both the British House of Commons and the United States Senate.