Wolf, who retired as head of the German Democratic Republic's foreign intelligence agency in 1986 after 35 years of service, died Thursday morning in his apartment in Berlin.
An association of Russia's foreign intelligence veterans said in a statement: "Many Soviet intelligence agents knew Markus Wolf personally, and would closely cooperate with him, jointly fighting against imperialism to maintain peace and consolidate the positions of socialism in the Cold War era."
During WWII, Wolf worked for German People's Radio in Moscow, where his family fled from Nazis in 1934. When the war ended, he served as a counselor for East Germany's embassy to the Soviet Union.
In 1951, Wolf joined the fledgling communist state's foreign intelligence agency, part of the East German secret police, known as the Stasi.
"When the young GDR's intelligence service was established, he became a prominent member, and then a long-standing helmsman of one of the world's most efficient intelligence agencies," said the statement.
Wolf, believed to have planted some 4,000 agents in the West to steal NATO secrets for the Soviet bloc, faced prosecution on espionage, treason and bribery charges following the reunification of Germany.
He fled to Moscow in 1990, but surrendered to German authorities a year later. He was convicted and sentenced to 6 years in jail in 1993, but the sentence was eventually overturned by an appeals court.
