[4] Alexander Lasarevich Abramov was born in Šiauliai, an industrial and commercial city in Lithuania, which at that time of his birth had already been incorporated within the Russian Empire for approximately a century.

In 1921 he took part in the Polish–Soviet War: at the direction of one of the Bolshevik leaders, Leon Trotsky, from 1920 Abramov was organising the Soviets' so-called "German brigade" on the western front.

He was in charge of the Berlin information hub of the International Liaison Department (Отдел международной связи / ОМС / OMS), which focused on collecting and collating foreign intelligence from across central Europe.

[3] It appears to have been in 1926 that he relocated and took over leadership of the OMS at its Moscow headquarters, in succession to Osip Piatnitsky (who nevertheless continued to play a leading role in the Intelligence department of the ECCI).

[5] Among the various accusations, it was said that he had used the OMS to channel money to Trotsky, who had fallen foul of Stalin some years earlier but was, at this stage, still alive and living in exile while trying to hide from Soviet agents.

On 25 November 1937 it was determined by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the Soviet Union that he had led the Trotskyist terror organisation within the Comintern, and also worked for the German Intelligence services.