Dignitaries attend Yeltsin’s burial
MOSCOW – Former President Boris N. Yeltsin, putting an end to Soviet practices in death as he did in life, was buried Wednesday with Russian Orthodox rites. The service marked the first time in more than a century that Russia bid a religious farewell to a deceased head of state.
Former U.S. Presidents George H.W. Bush and Clinton were among the dignitaries who gathered for a memorial at central Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral, which was followed by burial at Novodevichy cemetery.
During the procession to the cemetery, Yeltsin’s coffin was carried on a gun carriage pulled by an armored vehicle and followed by his family, Russian President Vladimir V. Putin and dozens of dignitaries.
At the graveside, Yeltsin’s widow, Naina, stroked and kissed his forehead and face, then blessed him with the sign of the cross. The coffin was then closed, and an artillery salute fired as it was lowered into the grave.
“The fate of Boris Nikolayevich reflects the entire dramatic history of the 20th century,” Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexei II, who was unable to attend because of medical treatment, said in a statement read out at the cathedral service. “At the turn of the 1980s and the early 1990s, he became a witness and a participant in a historic turnaround in the life of Russia. At that time the will of our people for freedom became manifest. Boris Nikolayevich sensed that will and helped for it to be carried out.”
Putin later praised the man who elevated him to power as having “sincerely tried to do everything possible to make the lives of millions of Russians better.”
The memorial looked like a reunion of some of the world’s most prominent figures of the 1990s. Former British Prime Minister John Major and former Polish President Lech Walesa were among those present.
A television camera providing live coverage lingered on former Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, to whom Yeltsin was first an ally and then a rival, as he offered condolences to the widow.
The last time Russia held a religious funeral service for a national leader was when Czar Alexander III died in 1894. His successor, Czar Nicholas II, was executed with family members by the Bolsheviks in 1918, and their bodies were unceremoniously dumped in a pit. Remains believed to be those of Nicholas II, his wife and three of their children were reburied in St. Petersburg in 1998.
Yeltsin, who died Monday of heart disease at the age of 76, led Russia from 1991 to 1999. His years in power were marked by economic turmoil that caused millions of Russians to fall into poverty. But he played a key role in bringing a measure of democracy to the country.