Anatoly Lukyanov is a domestic (Soviet) politician. Ex-chairman of the Supreme Council of the USSR. One of the accused in the GKChP case. He spent about a year in custody on charges of a coup d'etat.
Biography Politician
Anatoly Lukyanov was born in Smolensk in 1930. His father died at the front. At 13, he himself went to the defense factory as a worker at the height of World War II.
This did not stop Lukyanov from studying well, in 1948 he graduated from high school with a gold medal. From Smolensk to the capital, he went as an aspiring poet. He has already been published in local newspapers and had friendly reviews from his fellow countryman, author of "Vasily Terkin" Alexander Twardovsky.
In 1953, Anatoly Lukyanov received a law degree at Moscow State University, it remains to study in graduate school.
He works in the legal department at the Council of Ministers of the USSR. Then he is sent by a legal adviser, first to Hungary, and then to Poland. In 1976, takes part in the development of a new constitution of the USSR.
After the adoption of this important state document, it is included in the secretariat of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.
In 1979 he became a doctor of law. His dissertation was devoted to research in public law. In 1984, he became a deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR from the Smolensk region.
Participation in the work of the State Emergency Committee
In his memoirs, Anatoly Ivanovich Lukyanov claims that he himself did not consider it necessary to impose a state of emergency. He announced this on March 18 to one of the leaders of the Soviet Union, Valentin Pavlov, who was then prime minister.
Two days later, Rutskoi, Khasbulatov and Silaev met with Lukyanov in the Kremlin. They demanded to stop the work of the State Emergency Committee, to return Mikhail Gorbachev to Moscow. At the same time, no ultimate demands were made. Therefore, Anatoly Lukyanov decided that they did not want to aggravate the situation.
His companions in the GKChP note: Lukyanov initially took an excessively soft position, when a lot depended on the Supreme Council.
GKChP role
The state emergency committee, which ultimately included Anatoly Lukyanov, was organized to save the Soviet Union from collapse.
He lasted four days. The members of the Emergency Committee were categorically against Gorbachev's reforms, as well as the creation of the CIS, where initially only part of the republics of the former USSR planned to join.
The leadership of the RSFSR, headed by President Yeltsin, refused to obey the decrees of the Emergency Committee, declaring that their actions were contrary to the constitution. The GKChP activity led to the August putsch.
Already at the end of summer, the committee was dissolved. All who participated in his work or assisted the leaders of the State Emergency Committee were arrested.
GKChP members arrest
The first to arrest the politicians who headed the GKChP. These are Yanaev, Baklanov, Kryuchkov, Pavlov, Pugo, Starodubtsev, Tizyakov and Yazov. Anatoly Lukyanov was taken into custody one of the last.
The politician himself believed that his arrest was caused by the fact that Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin were afraid that he would be elected to the leadership at the Congress of People’s Deputies, because of this, the success of democracy could come to naught.
On August 29, a decision was issued to arrest Lukyanov and prosecute him for an attempted coup. He spent more than a year in the Moscow jail.
Charges and Release
Anatoly Lukyanov, whose biography was closely related to the USSR, was initially accused of treason. Then the wording was changed to an attempt to seize power and abuse of authority.
Lukyanov refused to give evidence in the GKChP case. The ending of this story was happy for all participants. At the end of 1992, all those arrested were released on bail. And in February 1994, the State Duma announced an amnesty for everyone related to the State Emergency Committee.
After release
Once free, in 1993 Lukyanov won the State Duma elections, having received a mandate from the Smolensk region. Then he was twice re-elected to the federal parliament.
Lukyanov is the author of more than 350 scientific papers. Most of them are devoted to constitutional law and legal theory. In 2010, he published a book about his own vision of the events of those days, entitled "August 91st. Was there a conspiracy?"
However, he did not abandon his youthful passion for poetry. Poetic collections were printed under the pseudonyms Anatoly Osenev and Dneprov.
His wife Lyudmila Lukyanova is a biologist, doctor of sciences. He works at the Department of Constitutional Law of the Higher School of Economics.
He is fond of mountaineering since his youth, according to his own statements he was friends with Lev Gumilyov, whom he met in the late 60s. Lukyanov helped him as a lawyer in the process inherited by Anna Akhmatova. Gumilyov wanted to transfer her archive to the Pushkin House.
Anatoly Ivanovich Lukyanov played a large role in the development of his native Smolensk region. Biography, awards received by him, testify to this. Lukyanov has the title of honorary citizen of the hero city of Smolensk. He was awarded the orders of the October Revolution, the Red Banner of Labor, and the medal of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation.
He has the status of Honored Lawyer of the Russian Federation.
Lukyanov’s rare passion is well known. He collects phonograms with the recording of voices of poets and other famous personalities. In 2006, he even released a separate edition of “100 poets of the 20th century. Poems in the author’s performance”, providing the notes with their own comments.
Now Lukyanov is 86 years old, he lives in Moscow.