Russians of all ages lined the hall and laid flowers on a plinth at the base of the coffin, sneaking a brief and final look to the sound of mournful music.
Thousands of Russians filed past the open coffin of Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, today, with many saying they wanted to commemorate him as the “peacemaker” who dismantled totalitarianism and gave them their freedom.
Gorbachev, leader of the Soviet Union from 1985 to 1991, died on Tuesday, August 30, aged 91. His body was placed in public pilgrimage in the great Hall of Columns in central Moscow in the wake of past Soviet leaders, including Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin.
The man affectionately known as “Gorby” in the West and who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 for his role in ending the Cold War was subsequently buried in Moscow’s famous Novodevichy Cemetery next to his wife Raisa, who died in 1999.
Dmitry Muratov, director of the Novaya Gazeta newspaper and himself a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, led the procession holding a portrait of his friend.
A priest read a short prayer before a military band played the Russian national anthem, which is the same as the Soviet one, as Gorbachev’s coffin was lowered into the earth. Honor guard fired three shots into the air.
Earlier, escorted by two armed members of the Kremlin’s elite military corps and with the hall’s 54 chandeliers casting only a dim light, the former president’s body was placed in an open coffin with his face and upper body visible.
His daughter Irina and her two daughters sat near the coffin.
Russians of all ages lined the hall and laid flowers on a plinth at the base of the casket, sneaking a brief and final look to the sound of mournful music and a huge black-and-white portrait of Gorbachev looking down.
Best known in the West for his contribution to ending the Cold War, reducing his country’s nuclear stockpile, and bringing about the untimely demise of the Soviet Union, Gorbachev’s legacy continues to divide public opinion inside and outside of Russia.
But those queuing to see him off remembered the politician, who died in Moscow after an unspecified illness, with gratitude.
“He was a peacemaker, he was one of God’s sons,” said Tatiana, 80, who said she came despite her ill health.
“He wanted to give us democracy and freedom and we proved that we weren’t quite ready yet,” said Alexander Lebedev, a tycoon and close friend.
“It’s a shame, but we’re still a European country. This piece of history will pass someday.”
Putin is absent
President Vladimir Putin paid tribute to Gorbachev last Thursday but stayed away from today’s memorial service, with the Kremlin citing his busy schedule.
Nor was Gorbachev afforded a public funeral as was the case for his staunch nemesis, Boris Yeltsin, the first post-Soviet president who named Putin as his successor, who died in 2007.
Some interpreted Putin’s absence as a sign of defiance from a former KGB officer who has rolled back many of Gorbachev’s reforms and has said he sees the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 as the biggest geopolitical disaster of the 20th century, which he would reverse if his given the opportunity.
“I think it’s a kind of statement,” Vladimir Pozner, a veteran journalist, told Reuters.
“And I don’t think Mr. Putin is any particular fan of Gorbachev. I think they saw the world very differently.”
Gorbachev, like Putin, was devastated by the collapse of the Soviet Union, but is accused by many Russians of setting in motion a reform process that spiraled out of control and encouraged the USSR’s 15 republics to secede.
This process heralded a period of new freedoms in Russia but also of economic hardship and sometimes bloody redistribution of state property that left many Russians feeling angry and humiliated.
Silent protest?
Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev paid tribute to Gorbachev today, as did some, but not all, of the Kremlin’s top political figures.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán arrived in Moscow to pay his respects. But with Russia under Western sanctions over what Putin calls a “special military operation” in Ukraine, other European and Western leaders were absent.
Among the mourners were many young Russians who had not even been born when the Soviet Union collapsed.
“Yes, he made some socio-economic mistakes, but they all pale in comparison to what he did for freedom of the press and for international relations. Things like the fall of the Berlin Wall,” said Oleg, 22, a former history student.
Andrei Zubov, a historian who knew Gorbachev, said the participation of young people was a silent protest against the current political system.
But he said he was disappointed by the turnout given Gorbachev’s role in Russian history, suggesting it shows how little Russians value freedom over tyranny.
“When Stalin’s body was put on a popular pilgrimage here (in 1953), hundreds of thousands of people came and some died in the stampede,” Zubov said.
“But when Gorbachev died, [μόλις μερικές] thousands of people came to honor a man who gave us our freedom. It is not much.”
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