nEUrosis

Yeltsin obituaries - whistlestop tour

April 28th, 2007 by Laura Citron

The press at the moment is predictably full of obituaries of Boris Yeltsin, whose funeral took place in Moscow last week. The BBC obituary is fine for a brief and factual, if not particularly insightful account. The Economist’s Edward Lucas goes deeper, offering some interesting insights into the dynamics of Yeltsin’s inner circle. For a classic Western-liberal-intelligentsia take, read Masha Lipman in the Washington Post. For Ms Lipman, Yeltsin is “largely unappreciated” by the Russian public. She even excuses his destructive alcoholism as “probably the only relief he had from the terrible strain.” One of the most critical pieces is in Time Magazine, which also has some interesting blogs on the subject. There is a nice video-collage of Yeltsin’s defining moments on FoxNews - including the infamous drunken-orchestra-conducting-incident. RIA-Novosti, the Russian state information and news agency, offers a short factual biography of Yeltsin. According to RIA-Novosti political commentator Vladimir Simonov, the West is grateful to Yeltsin for ”creating a Russia that no longer scares us.” The Al-Jazeera obituary includes a box of classic Yeltsin quotes to impress your friends in the pub. For a more comprehensive review of the coverage of Yeltsin’s death, see the NearAbroad blog.

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