Biografía

As a sensation, "Stern" reporter Gerd Heidemann presented the "Hitler Diaries" in 1983, but it turned out they were fakes.

He came to the "Stern" in 1955 and made a career there as a photo and war reporter.

In 1965 Heidemann received the World Press Photo Award, he had portrayed the German mercenary Siegfried Müller (s nicknamed: "Congo-Müller") during the civil war in the Congo.

In the 1970s, Heidemann bought the yacht Carin II, which had belonged to Hermann Göring, met his daughter Edda Göring and had an affair with her which lasted for five years. They entertained on the yacht and their guests included two Second World War generals, Karl Wolff and Wilhelm Mohnke.

In 2002, Der Spiegel alleged that Heidemann had worked as a double-agent for the Stasi, and that the publication of the Hitler diaries had been part of a Soviet and East German plan to embarrass and discredit the Capitalist West. In the BBC Radio 4 programme The Reunion broadcast on 7 September 2008, Heidemann vehemently denied that he had ever been a spy for the Stasi.