Guwahati: Former President of Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev breathed his last at the age of 91 on Tuesday.
This was informed by the Russian news agency.
Gorbachev is credited for ending the Cold War, although he was unable to stop the fall of the Soviet Union. According to the hospital, Sputnik News Agency reported that he passed away after a serious and protracted illness.
Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev passed away this evening following a terrible and protracted illness, according to the news source, which cited the Central Clinical Hospital.
Gorbachev served as the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics’ final president (USSR). He was a youthful, energetic soviet leader with the aim to liberalise the populace and restructure the communist system along democratic lines.
He refrained from deploying force even when pro-democracy demonstrations erupted in the Soviet Union of communist Eastern Europe in 1989.
Gorbachev acknowledged the Glasnost doctrine, or freedom of speech, which had been severely restricted under the previous administration. As a result of the Soviet economy’s covert inflation and supply shortages, he started a campaign of economic reform known as Perestroika, or restructuring. Press freedom and artistic freedom were also prevalent under his rule.
Gorbachev, the final president of the USSR, introduced a number of bold reforms aimed at reducing party dominance of the political system. Under his leadership, thousands of political prisoners and dissidents were freed from prison.
The United States of America awarded him the Nobel Peace Prize, and he is also credited with the success of the nuclear disarmament deal.
The New York Times reports that throughout the first five years of Gorbachev’s administration, substantial achievements were made. He oversaw the first-ever elimination of an entire class of nuclear weapons through an arms treaty with the United States.
Gorbachev also started the process of removing the majority of Soviet tactical nukes from Eastern Europe. According to US media, he announced the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan as an acknowledgement that the 1979 invasion and subsequent nine-year occupation had been a failure.