MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Boris Yeltsin Moscow funeral announced

Yeltsin is remembered by world leaders as a courageous fighter for democracy

The body of former Russian President Boris Yeltsin is to lie in state in Moscow ahead of a funeral on Wednesday

The Kremlin said Yeltsin - the man who engineered the final collapse of the Soviet Union and pushed Russia toward pluralism and a market economy - would be buried at Moscow's Novodevichy Cemetery. Yeltsin died of heart failure on Monday afternoon at the age of 76. He died in the Central Clinical Hospital, Russian news agencies reported, citing Sergei Mironov, head of the presidential administration's medical centre. Although Yeltsin was initially admired abroad for his defiance of the monolithic Communist system, many Russians will remember him mostly for presiding over the steep decline of their nation. Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet president, summed up the complexity of Yeltsin's political life in a condolence statement minutes after the death was announced. He referred to Yeltsin as one "on whose shoulders are both great deeds for the country and serious errors," according to the news agency Interfax. Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on Monday that April 25th will be a national day of mourning and the country will pay its respects to Yeltsin. 'Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin was the first Russian president. With this title he has for ever entered the history of the country and the whole world. A man passed away, thanks to whom a whole new epoch was born. New democratic Russia was born, a free state open to the world, the state in which power truly belongs to the people', Putin said, quoted by the news agencies. World leaders responded quickly to his death, calling him a personal friend and praising him as a courageous fighter during the Soviet Union's dramatic change that marked the end of the Cold War. British Prime Minister Tony Blair called Yeltsin a 'remarkable man who saw the need for democratic and economic reform' in Russia. Former British Prime Minister John Major thinks Yeltsin had to deal with a difficult situation but he managed it in the best manner, by extending the democracy and introducing a market system. German Chancellor Angela Merkel called Yeltsin a 'true friend' of Germany, adding that his role in developing relations between Russia and German 'will not be forgotten'. 'His contribution to the development of relations between our two states will remain unforgotten' Merkel said in a statement. 'I have expressed my condolences and may say that Boris Yeltsin was an upright fighter for freedom and democracy, for a new alignment of Russia and a true friend of Germany she added. A spokesman for the State Department says Yeltsin 'led Russia through a period of historic transformation'. Defense Secretary Robert Gates thinks no American will forget how Yeltsin climbed on top of a tank to stand up against a coup trying to restore a dictatorial regime in Russia. Former chancellor Helmut Kohl called him a 'great statesman', whose 'contribution to Russo-German relations and world peace cannot be underestimated', adding that he considered Yeltsin 'a personal friend' with whom he 'enjoyed a close and trusting relationship'. Former Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze pointed what Yeltsin had done for both Russia and Georgia. The European Union and the Nato alliance hailed Yeltsin as a healer of the Cold War divide who opened up Russia to the rest of Europe. "As President he had enormous challenges and difficult mandates, but he certainly brought East and West closer together and helped replace confrontation by cooperation," said Jose Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission.