Secret Tapes of Katarina Witt
July 26, 2001 -- When Katarina Witt glided onto the ice, the world watched every move of the beautiful East German figure skater. But behind the curtain, her East German communist government was watching even more closely.
The East German secret police, the Stasi, was one of the most ruthless and powerful secret police forces in the world, and the iron fist of the East German dictatorship. The Stasi's mission was not just to keep enemies out, but also to make sure its most valuable assets stayed there to make the country proud — including world-class athletes like Witt.
"They wanted to make sure that I'd always come home … that I would not defect," says Witt, who says she had no idea at the time that the Stasi were monitoring her. But when the Berlin Wall came down in 1990, the veil of secrecy opened up on the Stasi and the files they had been compiling for more than 40 years — including 27 boxes marked with Witt's name.
"It was the first time I was confronted with [what] they [had] done basically," says Witt. "My first file starts when I'm 7 years old … I was watched over my entire life wherever I would go."
‘Betrayed From Both Sides’
Witt got access to the files in 1992, when there had been rumors of her being a Stasi spy. After going through the pages that cover 17 years of the intimate details of her life, she says, "I would go through all the different emotions where you're just absolutely upset and you're furious … at times I was laughing … I was just completely in shock. How far they even would go."
As she read through the 3,500 pages, Witt realized it was not just anonymous Stasi agents sneaking around her personal life. She learned that the betrayal had been much closer to home: that some of her closest friends had even spied on her, telling the government her most intimate secrets.
Ironically, the unification of East Germany with democratic West Germany has created a new and perhaps more embarrassing threat to Witt's privacy: The once-secret files are now at risk of becoming public.
"I feel betrayed from both sides," says Witt, referring to both the Communist government that kept secret files on her and the now-democratic country that allows for freedom of information and the press.
Protecting Her Privacy
Witt has asked a German court to seal her Stasi files forever, a request that has brought forth accusations that she has something to hide.
"Why do I always have to sit here now with my back against the wall explaining myself, explaining my past, trying to defend myself where there is nothing else to explain and nothing to defend?" Witt tells ABCNEWS' Elizabeth Vargas. "I need to protect some pieces of my life … I just don't want to confront it anymore. I mean I haven't done anything wrong. That's the whole point."
She adds, "There is nothing to hide … Maybe I am ashamed of some things … but I didn't hurt anybody. I did not spy on somebody … I just do not want somebody going through theose pages and reading about what happened when I was a teenager."
A German court could decide sometime this summer whether her files will remain secret or be disclosed.