Title: Boris Yeltsin – Russiapedia Leaders Prominent Russians
Headings: Prominent Russians:
Boris Yeltsin

Prominent Russians: Boris Yeltsin
February 1, 1931 – April 23, 2007

Content: Just days after the USSR’s dissolution, the government embarked on a series of unprecedented reforms along the lines of “shock therapy”. A shift towards market-oriented economy and massive privatisation shook a country that was used to state control to the core. The wild-west capitalism meant poverty for many and staggering wealth for the few, as well as crippling economic depression, soaring inflation and rampant crime and corruption. Salaries weren’t paid and many pensioners saw their lifelong savings wiped out. The reforms soon became widely resented, seen as “shock without therapy”. AFP Photo
In 1993, a deadlock with the increasingly frustrated legislators pushed the country to the verge of civil war. Yeltsin’s opponents barricaded themselves in the White House and moved to take control of Moscow’s television centre. Yeltsin called in the tanks – and managed to shell his way out of the conflict. A parliamentary election was held and a new Constitution, concentrating power in the hands of the President, was approved in a referendum. The tanks though were needed again in 1994 when the southern republic of Chechnya tried to break away.