marble staircase beneath chandeliers draped in black gauze. On the stage at the left side of the Column Hall, a full orchestra in black tailcoats played classical music. The deceased's embalmed body, dressed in a black suit, white shirt and a tie, was displayed in an open coffin on a catafalque banked with carnations, red roses and tulips, facing the queue of mourners. A small guard of honour would be in attendance in the background. At the right side of the hall, seats were placed for guests of honour, with the front row reserved for the dead leader's family. On the day of the funeral, a military funeral parade would take place during which the coffin would be conveyed from the House of the Unions to Red Square where burial would take place. Lenin and Stalin were placed inside the Lenin Mausoleum, while Brezhnev, Andropov, and Chernenko were interred in individual graves in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis. Singapore At state funerals in Singapore, the state flag is draped over the coffin. The vigil guard may be deployed during the public lying in state of the deceased person at Parliament House. The deployment of the vigil guard is the highest form of respect accorded by the nation to the deceased. Similar to British traditions, the vigil guard is composed of groups of five commissioned officers from the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) and Singapore Police Force (SPF) who stand guard around the clock in shifts of 30 minutes. Four of the five officers stand facing outward at each of the four corners of the coffin, while the fifth and most senior stands in front and faces inward. Their heads are bowed and their ceremonial swords are inverted. Vigil guards were stationed at the public lying in state of Goh Keng Swee in May 2010, Lee Kuan Yew in March 2015, and S. R. Nathan in August 2016. South Africa Nelson Mandela was the first democratically elected president to lie in state in South Africa. The event took place at the Union Buildings in Pretoria, the same site where he was inaugurated as the President of South Africa on 10 May 1994. Mandela lay in state from 11 December through 13 December 2013 with thousands of South Africans filing past the coffin before it was flown to Mthatha where Mandela was buried on 15 December 2013 in nearby Qunu in the Eastern Cape.