Agostinho Lourenço da Conceição Pereira (5 September 1886 – 2 August 1964) was a Portuguese

soldier A soldier is a person who is a member of an army. A soldier can be a conscripted or volunteer enlisted person, a non-commissioned officer, or an officer. Etymology The word ''soldier'' derives from the Middle English word , from Old French ...

, best known for founding and running the Portuguese political police under the '' Estado Novo''. Lourenço fought in

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

for the British. After the war, he acted briefly as governor of

Leiria Leiria (; cel-x-proto, ɸlāryo) is a city and municipality in the Central Region of Portugal. It is the 2nd largest city in that same region, with a municipality population of 128,640 (as of 2021) in an area of . It is the seat of its own distr ...

. He was made

Commander of the Royal Victorian Order The Royal Victorian Order (french: Ordre royal de Victoria) is a dynastic order of knighthood established in 1896 by Queen Victoria. It recognises distinguished personal service to the British monarch, Monarchy of Canada, Canadian monarch, Mon ...

for services to the future

Edward VIII Edward VIII (Edward Albert Christian George Andrew Patrick David; 23 June 1894 – 28 May 1972), later known as the Duke of Windsor, was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Empire and Emperor of India from 20 January 19 ...

, then Prince of Wales, who was visiting Lisbon in 1931. In 1933, in the early days of the Salazar regime, Lourenço founded the

PVDE The International and State Defense Police ( pt, Polícia Internacional e de Defesa do Estado; PIDE) was a Portuguese security agency that existed during the '' Estado Novo'' regime of António de Oliveira Salazar. Formally, the main roles of th ...

, Portugal's security and immigration police. According to Professor Douglas Wheeler, "an analysis of Lourenco's career suggests strongly that British Intelligence Services' influence had an impact on the structure and activity of PVDE". Lourcenço had earned a reputation with British observers, recorded in a confidential print generated at the British embassy, which suggested a "pro-British" bias on his part. He always kept a good relationship with the

MI6 The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), commonly known as MI6 ( Military Intelligence, Section 6), is the foreign intelligence service of the United Kingdom, tasked mainly with the covert overseas collection and analysis of human intelligenc ...

, which allowed him in 1956 to become the president of

Interpol The International Criminal Police Organization (ICPO; french: link=no, Organisation internationale de police criminelle), commonly known as Interpol ( , ), is an international organization that facilitates worldwide police cooperation and cri ...

, which he remained for five years.

References

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* * * 1886 births 1964 deaths Portuguese military personnel Portuguese police officers {{Portugal-bio-stub