Alexander Yakolev ,a pro-reformist, was the architect and ideologist of Peretroika and glasnost, main supporter of Gorbachev and was committed to democracy to his dying days. Born in 1923 he was a Second World War hero who joined Communist Party during War and rose to hold senior position in its decision making body.
Yahovlev was the first Russian to voice dissenting views on great power chauvinism, local nationalism and
anti-Semitism. This resulted in him being branded as agent of influence of west in seventies, to being sent into an honorable exile in his own country and then in being appointed as Soviet ambassador to Canada. The
political exile ended when Gorbachev allowed him to return to his country after cooling heels in Canada for ten years.
Yakovlev then brandished all type of conformists political punks, worked to end totalitarian regime in Soviet Union and made anti-Stalinism his life’s sole mission. When USSR disintegrated he was initially condemned by communist revanchists for engineering the collapse
After the dissolution of USSR, Yakovlev abandoned active politics and retired to write two- dozen historical books and
work to rehabilitate victims of Stalin’s purges. His favorites phrase “Enough of
lies” had an explosive effect on Russian masses. He died on 18th October 2005 while working as an enemy of lies and weeding out lies from the system to make it work faster.
The writer is political commentator ,RIA Novosti.