When was Anatoly Sobchak born? Anatoly Alexandrovich Sobchak biography. The beginning of a political career

Anatoly Sobchak is a well-known democratic reformer and politician of the Perestroika period, one of the authors of the current Constitution of the Russian Federation, the first mayor of St. Petersburg. IN last years life became a scandalous key figure in Russian politics, accused of corruption, abuse of office and bribery. Under his leadership, many high-ranking officials and diplomats of modern Russia worked in the mayor's office of St. Petersburg, including the President of the Russian Federation and the Prime Minister of Russia.

Sobchak Anatoly Alexandrovich was born on August 10, 1937 in Chita in an ordinary family. His father, Alexander Antonovich, worked as an engineer for railway, and mother Nadezhda Andreevna was an accountant. Young Sobchak was not the only child in the family, he had three more brothers.

Sobchak's childhood passed in the city of Kokand, located in Uzbekistan. The family moved there due to the transfer of his father to the service. The future politician studied at an ordinary local school with his brothers. He was a talented, attentive, diligent and persistent schoolboy who did not cause any trouble to either parents or teachers. At the end high school he entered the Faculty of Law at Tashkent University, but literally a year later, in 1954, he transferred to Leningrad State University, which most likely was the beginning of his fateful reunion with Peter.

At the university, student Sobchak actively showed his desire and ability to study, thanks to which he became a Lenin Scholar. In 1959, after graduating from high school, young Anatoly was assigned to work at the Stavropol Bar Association. In 1962, Sobchak returned to Leningrad, graduated from Leningrad State University and defended his Ph.D. thesis.

Then he taught for three years at the special police school of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR, and from 1968 to 1973 he was an assistant professor at the Faculty of Law at Leningrad State University. In 1985, Anatoly Alexandrovich headed the Department of Economic Law at the same faculty.

Career

Sobchak's political career began rapidly in 1989, when, after joining the CPSU, he was elected a people's deputy to the Supreme Soviet. Then he headed the subcommittee on economic legislation and law and order and became one of the founders of the Interregional Deputy Group of the USSR Armed Forces. Less than a year later, Anatoly Alexandrovich became a member of the Leningrad City Council and a month later he headed it, and in 1991, following the results of the elections, he became the first mayor of Leningrad. After Sobchak came to power, the city on the Neva returned its historical name and again began to be called St. Petersburg.

Most of the young specialists at that time worked in the St. Petersburg mayor's office under Sobchak, who are currently high-ranking officials and diplomats in the Kremlin. In particular, the prime minister of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev, the president of Russia Vladimir Putin, the head of OAO Gazprom, the president of the Rosneft company and many well-known Russian politicians were the confidants of the mayor of St. Petersburg.

In the very first year after taking office as St. Petersburg mayor, Sobchak actively showed himself and gained authority among the population. He took an active part in the creation of the Movement for Democratic Reforms, opposed the actions of the State Emergency Committee at the August 1991 coup in Leningrad, organized and called on the population to protest rallies against the actions of the State Committee for emergency regulations, which allowed Leningrad to resist the decrees of this department.

However, the authority of the first person of St. Petersburg was not indisputable. His sincere commitment to democracy closely intersected with a commitment to authoritarian methods of governing the city, which entailed endless conflicts with the local legislature.

There has always been a stir around Anatoly Sobchak

Sobchak also repeatedly became a defendant in high-profile foreign voyages and banquets in order to attract investors and humanitarian aid flows to the city. But the "staking on the West" led to the suppression of the St. Petersburg local industry. At the same time, city residents condemned the mayor for regular international events on the banks of the Neva and accused him of squandering the city budget.

In 1995, Sobchak's associates persuaded him to run for the Russian presidential election in 1996 and become a competitor to the ex-head of state. However, Anatoly Alexandrovich completely and categorically abandoned the idea. In 1996, he also lost the gubernatorial election to his deputy Vladimir Yakovlev and left the post of mayor of St. Petersburg.

Sobchak's political career faded as quickly as it began. The first mayor of St. Petersburg has become a symbol of a vibrant social group in Russia, which in the early 90s sought change in the country. For one part of society, Anatoly Alexandrovich is associated with the destroyer of a stable and familiar world order, while others perceive him as a figure leading the country to freedom through a revolutionary turning point.

Criminal prosecution

In October 1997, Anatoly Sobchak was involved in a criminal case on corruption in the St. Petersburg City Hall as a witness by the Prosecutor General's Office. After some time, Sobchak was brought to this criminal case as an accused under the articles “Bribes” and “Abuse of official powers”. Then the family of the ex-mayor of St. Petersburg became loudly discussed in the media and society, and Sobchak was accused of all mortal sins.

Against the background of these events, Anatoly Aleksandrovich's health condition seriously deteriorated, and instead of a prison cell, he ended up in cardiology with a heart attack. After some time, Sobchak left the city and flew to France for treatment. He lived in Paris until 1999 inclusive, where he decided to recall his scientific activities. He lectured at the Sorbonne and other leading universities in France, wrote two books and published more than 30 scientific articles.

In November 1999, the criminal case against Sobchak was dismissed for lack of corpus delicti, and he returned to Russia, declaring his intention to re-enter big politics. In early 2000, Sobchak took the position of a confidant of presidential candidate Vladimir Putin and headed the Political Council of Democratic Movements and Parties of St. Petersburg.

Personal life

Sobchak's first marriage took place during his student years. Then he married the first beauty of the Faculty of Philology of the Pedagogical Institute. Herzen Nonna Gandzyuk, who gave birth to his eldest daughter Maria. But in 1977, the family idyll faded away, the future mayor of St. Petersburg divorced his wife, having lived with her for 21 years.

Anatoly Sobchak with his wife Lyudmila

Sobchak's second wife was, whom he met as a lawyer and helped in a difficult divorce process with his first husband. Sobchak's second wife became his reliable and true companion in his political career, she always took an active part in her husband's affairs and supported him in all endeavors.

At the same time, the wife of the ex-mayor of St. Petersburg was engaged in the implementation of her own projects, in particular, she was a representative of the Russian government in the German trustee Fund "Remembrance, Responsibility and Future", and also held several responsible positions.

Anatoly Sobchak with his daughter Ksenia

In 1981, a daughter was born in the family of a politician, who is currently a Russian TV presenter and successful journalist. Sobchak's daughter, like Anatoly himself, is a controversial figure in society.

Death

On February 20, 2000, Anatoly Sobchak died in the Svetlogorsk hotel while acting as a confidant of presidential candidate Vladimir Putin. According to official figures, Sobchak's death was the result of an acute heart attack.

The sudden death of Anatoly Sobchak became a high-profile incident that led to large-scale gossip. Rumors about the death of the ex-mayor of St. Petersburg appeared and multiplied at lightning speed. Some stated that Sobchak was killed because he knew a lot, others put forward a version of alcohol poisoning and Viagra.

In May 2000, the prosecutor's office of the Kaliningrad region opened a criminal case regarding the murder of Sobchak by poisoning. But the examination after the autopsy showed that there was neither alcohol nor alcohol in the body of the politician. medicines, as a result of which on August 4 the criminal case on the murder of Sobchak was closed.

Anatoly Alexandrovich Sobchak was buried on February 24 in St. Petersburg at the Nikolsky cemetery.

Anatoly Alexandrovich Sobchak(August 10, 1937, Chita - February 19, 2000, Svetlogorsk, Kaliningrad region) - Soviet and Russian politician, the first mayor of St. Petersburg.

Anatoly Alexandrovich Sobchak
Mayor of St. Petersburg June 12, 1991 - June 16, 1996
Chairman of the Leningrad City Council of People's Deputies May 23, 1990 - 1991
Citizenship: Russia
Birth: 10 August 1937
Chita, East Siberian region, RSFSR, USSR
Death: February 19, 2000
Svetlogorsk, Kaliningrad region, Russia
Place of burial: Nikolskoye cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra
Party: CPSU (1988-1990), Our home is Russia (since 1996).
Education: Leningrad State University. A. A. Zhdanova
Academic degree: Doctor of Law

Paternal grandfather - Anton Semyonovich Sobchak- Pole, grandmother - Anna Ivanovna - Czech; on mother's side - Russian grandfather, Ukrainian grandmother. Father, Alexander Antonovich Sobchak, worked as a railway engineer, mother Nadezhda Andreevna Litvinova was an accountant by profession.
He spent his childhood in Uzbekistan (Kokand, Tashkent). In 1956 he entered the law faculty of the Leningrad State University.
Since 1959, after graduating from university, Anatoly Sobchak by assignment, he worked as a lawyer in the Stavropol Regional Bar Association, then as the head of a legal advice office in the Stavropol Territory.

In 1962 Anatoly Sobchak returned to Leningrad. Graduated from the postgraduate course of the Leningrad State University. From 1965 to 1968 Anatoly Sobchak taught at the Leningrad special school militia of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR. In 1968-1973 Anatoly Sobchak- Associate Professor of the Leningrad Technological Institute of the Pulp and Paper Industry. From 1973 to 1981 - Associate Professor of the Law Faculty of Leningrad State University, since 1982 Anatoly Sobchak- Doctor of Law and Professor of the same faculty, where since 1985 he held the position of head of the department of economic law. Prof. A. I. Lukyanov, who was at one time a member of the Higher Attestation Commission, recalled that he was instructed to review a candidate's dissertation Sobchak: "there were so many references to Lenin and other bosses that we in VAK decided to return the dissertation to the author so that he would rewrite it."

Political activities of Anatoly Sobchak

Anatoly Sobchak- Member of the CPSU since 1988, left the CPSU in 1990.

In 1989, according to the book by N. K. Svanidze, a young graduate student, the future president of Russia, D. A. Medvedev and several of his comrades were his confidants, put up posters and campaigned for Sobchak before the elections of people's deputies of the USSR. Anatoly Sobchak also was the supervisor of the Ph.D. thesis of D. A. Medvedev. In an interview with D. A. Medvedev on the Rossiya-1 TV channel, he confirms that he personally pasted up photographs of Sobchak, a candidate for people's deputies of the USSR, on the streets of Leningrad. Later, Sobchak invited him to work in the Leningrad City Council. In 1990, the then little-known assistant to the rector of Leningrad State University, Lieutenant Colonel of the 1st Directorate of the KGB V.V. Putin, joined the Sobchak team.
In 1989 Anatoly Sobchak elected People's Deputy of the USSR. At the first congress he became a member of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. He was chairman of the subcommittee of the USSR Supreme Council on economic legislation of the Committee on Legislation, Law and Order. In June 1989 he became a member of the Interregional Deputy Group.

He was a member of the commission to investigate the events in Tbilisi in April 1989. He claimed that when the rally was dispersed by the forces Soviet army used sapper shovels. Later he became an honorary citizen of the city of Tbilisi and Georgia.
In April 1990 he was elected to the Leningrad City Council. On May 23, 1990, he was elected chairman of the Leningrad City Council.
In 2003, the St. Petersburg historian and public figure I. Ivanov, in the journal Vestnik ROVS, published by the Russian All-Military Union, argued that, contrary to firmly rooted opinion, for a long time A. A. Sobchak opposed the return of his historical name to Leningrad - St. Petersburg and actively advocated the preservation of the name "Leningrad". This is also confirmed by the former deputy of the Leningrad City Council Marina Salye. According to the same I. B. Ivanov, only before the mayoral elections on June 12, Sobchak began to change his position and nevertheless supported the movement for St. .

The post of chairman of the Lensoviet implied the dependence of the chairman on the opinion of the council. Sobchak as chairman of the Leningrad City Council could be removed at any second by the same deputies. Therefore, the deputies were persuaded to introduce the post of mayor in Leningrad, as in Moscow. The decision to introduce the post was passed by a majority of one vote.
June 12, 1991 Anatoly Sobchak was elected mayor of Leningrad in elections held simultaneously with the presidential elections in Russia. At the same time, a referendum decided to return the name St. Petersburg to Leningrad.
In July 1991 Anatoly Sobchak was one of the founders of the Democratic Reform Movement.

Anatoly Sobchak actively opposed the actions of the GKChP in August 1991 and actually led the resistance to the putschists in Leningrad (according to Marina Salye, he supported the GKChP). Already on the morning of August 19, at the dacha of B. N. Yeltsin in Arkhangelsk, A. A. Sobchak participated in the drafting of the appeal “To the citizens of Russia” and the decree “On the illegality of the actions of the State Emergency Committee”, signed by B. N. Yeltsin, then on the same day he arrived to Leningrad, held talks with General V.N. Samsonov, which kept the latter from active actions in support of the GKChP, spoke at an emergency session of the Leningrad City Council, and then on Leningrad television with a statement about the illegality of the actions of the GKChP and called on the townspeople to come to the rally on August 20 at Dvortsovaya square, which brought together hundreds of thousands of demonstrators. Thanks to these measures, the decrees of the State Committee for the State of Emergency did not operate on the territory of Leningrad. Lensovet deputy Galina Spica expressed doubt that it was Sobchak who stopped the tanks that were marching on the city during the putsch of the State Committee for the State of Emergency:
I do not believe in such coincidences: he allegedly arranged for the tanks to be deployed at the very moment when we, the deputies of the Leningrad City Council, met with the leaders of the column of military equipment and talked with them.

Sobchak's position as the "first person" of the city was by no means indisputable. A sincere commitment to democracy was combined in him with a craving for authoritarian methods of leadership, which led to endless conflicts with the local legislature. Sobchak's constant trips abroad and banquets with his participation (because of which the press mocked the mayor so often) were aimed at attracting investors and new streams of humanitarian aid. However, the "bet on the West" led to the fact that the Petersburg industry itself was in the "corral". Numerous international events on the banks of the Neva did not arouse enthusiasm among the townspeople and brought accusations against the mayor of squandering city funds.

In 1992, Marina Salie acted as a permanent representative of the St. Petersburg City Council under the Supreme Council of Russia and was the head of the deputy group on the implementation of quotas for raw materials and materials for barter food supplies to the city by the Committee for Foreign Relations under the mayor of St. Petersburg in January-February 1992 held under the leadership of Vladimir Putin, Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee of the St. Petersburg Mayor's Office.
According to the results of the investigation, then the city budget was damaged by more than $ 100 million. The deputy group of the City Council of St. Petersburg demanded the dismissal of Putin from his post with the initiation of a criminal case. The final report of the group headed by Marina Salie was approved and supported by the decision of the Small Council of the Petrograd Soviet headed by Alexander Belyaev. Marina Salie also asked for assistance from the head of the control department of the presidential administration of the Russian Federation, Yuri Boldyrev, who became interested in the materials, but was soon dismissed. The mayor of St. Petersburg, Anatoly Sobchak, refused to comply with the recommendations of the commission of the Petrosoviet. All cases were stopped, and for a long time they were not remembered.

Anatoly Sobchak actively participated in the process of creating a new Constitution of Russia. By decision of the political council of the Russian Movement for Democratic Reforms, he supervised the writing of one of its alternatives, which he presented together with S. S. Alekseev in 1992. His daughter K. A. Sobchak and some politicians (V. L. Sheinis, V. I. Matvienko) called him one of the main authors of the draft of the current Constitution of the Russian Federation.

In October 1993 Anatoly Sobchak headed the federal list of candidates for the State Duma from the Russian Movement for Democratic Reforms. In the elections of December 12, 1993, the bloc did not get the number of votes necessary to enter the State Duma. Anton Antonov-Ovseenko, in his review of the book The Beatles of Perestroika, noted:
Anatoly Alexandrovich complained about his press secretary Muravyova, who was subordinate and received a salary from him as a governor, but she scolded him at all corners.
Since 1994 Anatoly Sobchak was chairman of the government of St. Petersburg.
A. A. Sobchak repeatedly made statements that St. Petersburg should not be an industrial center, but the cultural capital of Russia, a city-museum. In October 1992, in the status of the mayor of St. Petersburg Anatoly Sobchak appeals to the Society for the Revival of the Delphic Games expressing his full support for the noble idea. Following the creation in December 1994 of the International Delphic Council, in St. Petersburg from March 25 to March 31, 1996, with the active support of the City Government and the mayor personally, the First Delphic Congress was held, at which the Delphic Charter was adopted following the example Olympic Charter.

Sergei Stankevich convinced Sobchak to run for the presidency of Russia in the 1996 elections, however, “closer to December 1995, he (Sobchak) finally abandoned this idea, which he announced quite categorically ... they had a personal conversation with Yeltsin on this subject, during which Sobchak realized: Yeltsin will run for a second term no matter what.” It is because of this, says Stankevich, "at the beginning of 1996 against Sobchak was unleashed an unprecedented scale and cost persecution by those forces."

As I recalled Sobchak's daughter Ksenia:
“In December 1995, a campaign began to discredit Sobchak, which continued almost until the death of the pope. The formal reason for the persecution was the distribution of apartments in a renovated building in the center of St. Petersburg. This story is detailed in his book A Dozen Knives in the Back. The former Prosecutor General Yuri Skuratov, as well as Korzhakov, Soskovets, Barsukov, Kulikov took the most active part in the persecution of his father. It was a struggle of the Moscow Yeltsin team with Peter and specifically with my father, in whom they saw one of the contenders for the presidency ... they said that after Yeltsin left, Sobchak is one of the clear favorites for the post of head of state.
In February 1996, Anatoly Sobchak joined the St. Petersburg branch of the Our Home - Russia movement. On June 16, 1996, he lost the election of the governor of St. Petersburg to his deputy Vladimir Yakovlev. Officially, V.V. Putin was the head of Sobchak's campaign headquarters, although in fact the election campaign was led by different people.

Criminal case of Anatoly Sobchak

October 3, 1997 Anatoly Sobchak was involved by the Prosecutor General's Office as a witness in the case of corruption in the authorities of St. Petersburg.
In 1997, he was accused of abuse as mayor of St. Petersburg. On November 7, 1997, he flew to France for treatment at an American hospital in Paris. On September 13, 1998, the Russian Prosecutor General's Office opened a criminal case against Anatoly Sobchak under the articles "Bribe" and "Abuse of official authority." Lived in Paris until July 12, 1999. He lectured at the Sorbonne and other French universities. On November 10, 1999, the criminal case against Sobchak was terminated due to the lack of corpus delicti.

On December 21, 1999, he lost the elections to the State Duma to the candidate from Yabloko Petr Shelishch and announced that he had decided to participate in the election of the governor of St. Petersburg.
On February 14, 2000, he was appointed a confidant of a presidential candidate Russian Federation V. V. Putin and headed the Political Advisory Council of Democratic Parties and Movements of St. Petersburg. He died during a trip to the Kaliningrad region, undertaken as part of the election campaign.

Death of Anatoly Sobchak

He died on the night of February 19-20, 2000 at the Rus Hotel in Svetlogorsk (Kaliningrad Region), as a result, as reported in the official conclusion, of acute heart failure. Immediately there were rumors of a murder due to the fact that Sobchak "knew too much", and versions of alcohol poisoning and the effects of Viagra. As a result, on May 6, the prosecutor's office of the Kaliningrad region opened a criminal case on the fact of murder (poisoning). However, an autopsy in St. Petersburg stated the absence of both alcohol and poisoning. On August 4, the Kaliningrad prosecutor's office dropped the case.

Family of Anatoly Sobchak

Father - Alexander Antonovich Sobchak, worked as a railway engineer
Mother - Nadezhda Andreevna Litvinova, worked as an accountant
The first wife is Nonna Gandzyuk.
Daughter - Maria Sobchak (born 1965) - lawyer
Grandson - Gleb Sobchak (born 1983) - graduated from the Faculty of Law of St. Petersburg State University, lawyer
Second wife (since 1980) - Lyudmila Narusova
Daughter - Ksenia Sobchak (born 1981) - TV presenter.

"Today I am the head of the state, and therefore I cannot afford to speak sharply, but I will tell you my opinion in a generalized form. I believe that this is not just death, I believe that this is death. And this, of course, is the result of persecution" Vladimir Putin said that day.

Anatoly Alexandrovich Sobchak was born on August 10, 1937 in Chita. His father, Alexander Antonovich, worked as a railway engineer, and his mother, Nadezhda Andreevna Litvinova, served as an accountant. Anatoly was one of their four sons. When he was two years old, the family moved to Uzbekistan, where he graduated from high school (more)

After school, Anatoly Sobchak entered the law faculty of Tashkent University, and the very next year, in 1954, he transferred to Leningrad State University and became a Lenin Scholar.

In his student years, he married for the first time - to Nonna Gandzyuk, a student of the philological faculty of the Herzen Pedagogical Institute. From this marriage was born a daughter, Maria, who also became a lawyer and now works as a lawyer, specializing in criminal law. The son of Maria, the grandson of Anatoly Alexandrovich, Gleb is a student of the law faculty of St. Petersburg State University (more details)

After graduating from the university, Anatoly Sobchak worked for three years in the Stavropol Regional Bar Association for three years - first as a lawyer in the city of Nevinnomyssk, and then as head of legal advice (more)

In 1962 he returned to Leningrad. 1962-1965 - Postgraduate study at the Faculty of Law of the Leningrad State University, defense of a PhD thesis. From 1965 to 1968, Sobchak taught at the Leningrad Special Police School of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs. From 1968 to 1973 - Associate Professor at the Leningrad Technological Institute of the Pulp and Paper Industry.

Anatoly Sobchak is the author of over 200 books and articles on economics and law. He published his first book, Legal Problems of Cost Accounting in the Industry of the USSR, in 1971. From 1973 to 1981 - Associate Professor, since 1982 - Professor of the Faculty of Law of Leningrad State University. Here, after defending his doctoral dissertation in 1982, he created and headed the first department of economic law in the USSR (more info)

In 1980, Sobchak married a second time. Wife - Lyudmila Narusova, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Associate Professor of the Department of Russian History at the Academy of Culture, daughter Ksenia - a student at MGIMO (more details)

In 1989, at the first democratic elections, Anatoly Sobchak was elected People's Deputy of the USSR from the 47th Vasileostrovsky district of Leningrad. At the first congress, he became a member of the Supreme Council, the Committee on Legislation and Law and Order. Anatoly Sobchak was the chairman of the parliamentary commission investigating the tragic events of April 9, 1989 in Tbilisi, when during the dispersal of a rally by troops, many demonstrators were killed or injured. Anatoly Sobchak became one of the founders of the Interregional Deputy Group, formed from the deputies of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in June 1989.

In April 1990 he was elected a deputy of the Leningrad City Council of People's Deputies, on May 23, 1990 - Chairman of the Leningrad City Council. Following the results of the first popular elections of the head of the city on June 12, 1991, he became the mayor of St. Petersburg.

He was a member of the Presidential Advisory Council under the President of the USSR M.S. Gorbachev, a member of the Presidential Council under the President of Russia B.N. Yeltsin. Anatoly Sobchak headed the Constitutional Conference, which prepared the democratic Constitution of the new Russia.

Under the first democratically elected mayor of Leningrad on September 8, 1991, the historical name of St. Petersburg was returned to the city.

Mayor Sobchak managed to create a strong, professional team of young, educated and talented managers, most of whom now occupy leading government positions in Moscow. His main merits are in creating an attractive image of a European city, attracting investments to St. Petersburg, and establishing the status of the cultural capital of Russia. On his initiative, economic forums began to be held in the city, in 1994 the Goodwill Games, the largest international cultural festivals, were successfully held. For the first time, the official transfer of church buildings to the confessions represented in St. Petersburg began.

Anatoly Sobchak, as mayor of the city, carried out moderate reforms, defended the financial independence of the city, and fought against attempts by criminals to infiltrate the city's economy.

In early 1996, on the eve of the election of the head of the city, a campaign to discredit the mayor began, carried out through the media by the Prosecutor's Office, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and special services. An unprecedented smear campaign in the press and electoral fraud gave his opponent a 1.2% lead. However, even after the defeat in the elections, Sobchak remained a landmark democratic figure, enjoying great prestige. The persecution continued, the number of commissioned publications grew, invading, among other things, personal life.

On October 3, 1997, investigators from the prosecutor's office, despite Sobchak's statement about illness, tried to force him to be interrogated as a witness in the case of corruption in the authorities of St. Petersburg. Only the insistent demand of the wife to call " ambulance”, which determined the heart attack, forced the investigators to abandon their intentions. Sobchak lay in the cardio resuscitation department of the 122th medical unit for about a month - as it turned out, with a third heart attack. Then he was transferred to the clinic of the Military Medical Academy, to the chief cardiac surgeon of the city, Colonel General Yu.L. Shevchenko. During the entire period of his treatment, doctors were under serious pressure and direct threats were made against them. Therefore, for a calm continuation of treatment, Anatoly Sobchak was taken to France on November 7, 1997 by his wife. In Paris, he underwent a course of treatment and then taught at the university, worked in the archives on books.

“I don’t wish my enemies to go through what I and my loved ones have experienced over the past four years,” Anatoly Sobchak writes in his latest political book, A Dozen Knives in the Back. “From a person with an impeccable reputation, I turned into a corrupt official in an instant, slandered and persecuted, accused of all mortal sins."

Despite the fact that friends advised not to return, Anatoly Sobchak returned to St. Petersburg on July 12, 1999. By this time, Prosecutor General Yuri Skuratov had been removed from his post, Yuri Shutov, one of the most active performers of the smear campaign unleashed against Sobchak, was arrested on suspicion of organizing a gang of murderers. In October 1999, Sobchak received an official notice from the Prosecutor General's Office to close the criminal case. None of the "accusations" circulated by the press have been confirmed. Lawsuits were won in courts for the protection of honor and dignity in connection with slanderous publications. But the press was in no hurry to apologize, and the previously published lies did their dirty work. In December 1999, Sobchak ran for the State Duma in the 211th Central District, in the face of strong opposition from the city authorities and in the absence of support from the leaders of the right forces. As in the 1996 elections, he lacked 1.2% to win, which this time turned out to be fatal.

In early 2000, Anatoly Sobchak became a confidant of Russian presidential candidate V.V. Putin, and in this capacity, on February 15, he went to Kaliningrad.

The first mayor of St. Petersburg, Anatoly Sobchak, died suddenly on the night of February 20, 2000 in the city of Svetlogorsk, Kaliningrad Region. On February 24, thousands of people came to the Tauride Palace to say goodbye to Anatoly Alexandrovich. And although the farewell was extended for several hours, not everyone was able to get into the Catherine Hall of the Tauride Palace. "It turns out that he was needed, it turns out that we loved him. His life has been unfairly difficult lately," Daniil Granin said at the funeral service.

"Today I am the head of the state, and therefore I cannot afford to speak sharply, but I will tell you my opinion in a generalized form. I believe that this is not just death, I believe that this is death. And this, of course, is the result of persecution" Vladimir Putin said that day.

Anatoly Sobchak is buried at the Nikolsky cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra.

BIOGRAPHY

Anatoly Alexandrovich Sobchak was born on August 10, 1937 in Chita. His father, Alexander Antonovich, worked as a railway engineer, and his mother, Nadezhda Andreevna Litvinova, served as an accountant. Anatoly was one of their four sons. When he was two years old, the family moved to Uzbekistan, where he graduated from high school.

After school, Anatoly Sobchak entered the law faculty of Tashkent University, and the very next year, in 1954, he transferred to Leningrad State University and became a Lenin Scholar.

In his student years, he married for the first time - to Nonna Gandzyuk, a student of the philological faculty of the Herzen Pedagogical Institute. From this marriage was born a daughter, Maria, who also became a lawyer and now works as a lawyer, specializing in criminal law. The son of Maria, the grandson of Anatoly Alexandrovich, Gleb is a student of the law faculty of St. Petersburg State University (more details)

After graduating from the university, Anatoly Sobchak worked for three years in the Stavropol Regional Bar Association for three years - first as a lawyer in the city of Nevinnomyssk, and then as head of legal advice (more)

In 1962 he returned to Leningrad. 1962-1965 - Postgraduate study at the Faculty of Law of the Leningrad State University, defense of a PhD thesis. From 1965 to 1968, Sobchak taught at the Leningrad Special Police School of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs. From 1968 to 1973 - Associate Professor at the Leningrad Technological Institute of the Pulp and Paper Industry.

Anatoly Sobchak is the author of over 200 books and articles on economics and law. He published his first book, Legal Problems of Cost Accounting in the Industry of the USSR, in 1971. From 1973 to 1981 - Associate Professor, since 1982 - Professor of the Faculty of Law of Leningrad State University. Here, after defending his doctoral dissertation in 1982, he created and headed the first department of economic law in the USSR.

In 1980, Sobchak married a second time. Wife - Lyudmila Narusova, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Associate Professor of the Department of Russian History at the Academy of Culture, daughter Ksenia - a student at MGIMO (more details)

In 1989, at the first democratic elections, Anatoly Sobchak was elected People's Deputy of the USSR from the 47th Vasileostrovsky district of Leningrad. At the first congress, he became a member of the Supreme Council, the Committee on Legislation and Law and Order. Anatoly Sobchak was the chairman of the parliamentary commission investigating the tragic events of April 9, 1989 in Tbilisi, when during the dispersal of a rally by troops, many demonstrators were killed or injured. Anatoly Sobchak became one of the founders of the Interregional Deputy Group, formed from the deputies of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in June 1989.

In April 1990 he was elected a deputy of the Leningrad City Council of People's Deputies, on May 23, 1990 - Chairman of the Leningrad City Council. Following the results of the first popular elections of the head of the city on June 12, 1991, he became the mayor of St. Petersburg.

He was a member of the Presidential Advisory Council under the President of the USSR M.S. Gorbachev, a member of the Presidential Council under the President of Russia B.N. Yeltsin. Anatoly Sobchak headed the Constitutional Conference, which prepared the democratic Constitution of the new Russia.

Under the first democratically elected mayor of Leningrad on September 8, 1991, the historical name of St. Petersburg was returned to the city.

Mayor Sobchak managed to create a strong, professional team of young, educated and talented managers, most of whom now occupy leading government positions in Moscow. His main merits are in creating an attractive image of a European city, attracting investments to St. Petersburg, and establishing the status of the cultural capital of Russia. On his initiative, economic forums began to be held in the city, in 1994 the Goodwill Games, the largest international cultural festivals, were successfully held. For the first time, the official transfer of church buildings to the confessions represented in St. Petersburg began.

Anatoly Sobchak, as mayor of the city, carried out moderate reforms, defended the financial independence of the city, and fought against attempts by criminals to infiltrate the city's economy.

In early 1996, on the eve of the election of the head of the city, a campaign to discredit the mayor began, carried out through the media by the Prosecutor's Office, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and special services. An unprecedented smear campaign in the press and electoral fraud gave his opponent a 1.2% lead. However, even after the defeat in the elections, Sobchak remained a landmark democratic figure, enjoying great prestige. The persecution continued, the number of custom-made publications, invading, among other things, personal life, grew.

On October 3, 1997, investigators from the prosecutor's office, despite Sobchak's statement about illness, tried to force him to be interrogated as a witness in the case of corruption in the authorities of St. Petersburg. Only the insistent demand of his wife to call an ambulance, which determined the heart attack, forced the investigators to abandon their intentions. Sobchak lay in the cardio resuscitation department of the 122th medical unit for about a month - as it turned out, with a third heart attack. Then he was transferred to the clinic of the Military Medical Academy, to the chief cardiac surgeon of the city, Colonel General Yu.L. Shevchenko. During the entire period of his treatment, doctors were under serious pressure and direct threats were made against them. Therefore, for a calm continuation of treatment, Anatoly Sobchak was taken to France on November 7, 1997 by his wife. In Paris, he underwent a course of treatment and then taught at the university, worked in the archives on books.

“I don’t wish my enemies to go through what I and my loved ones have experienced over the past four years,” Anatoly Sobchak writes in his latest political book, A Dozen Knives in the Back. “From a person with an impeccable reputation, I turned into a corrupt official in an instant, slandered and persecuted, accused of all mortal sins."

Despite the fact that friends advised not to return, Anatoly Sobchak returned to St. Petersburg on July 12, 1999. By this time, Prosecutor General Yuri Skuratov had been removed from his post, Yuri Shutov, one of the most active performers of the smear campaign unleashed against Sobchak, was arrested on suspicion of organizing a gang of murderers. In October 1999, Sobchak received an official notice from the Prosecutor General's Office to close the criminal case. None of the "accusations" circulated by the press have been confirmed. Lawsuits were won in courts for the protection of honor and dignity in connection with slanderous publications. But the press was in no hurry to apologize, and the previously published lies did their dirty work. In December 1999, Sobchak ran for the State Duma in the 211th Central District, in the face of strong opposition from the city authorities and in the absence of support from the leaders of the right forces. As in the 1996 elections, he lacked 1.2% to win, which this time turned out to be fatal.

In early 2000, Anatoly Sobchak became a confidant of Russian presidential candidate V.V. Putin, and in this capacity, on February 15, he went to Kaliningrad.

The first mayor of St. Petersburg, Anatoly Sobchak, died suddenly on the night of February 20, 2000 in the city of Svetlogorsk, Kaliningrad Region. On February 24, thousands of people came to the Tauride Palace to say goodbye to Anatoly Alexandrovich. And although the farewell was extended for several hours, not everyone was able to get into the Catherine Hall of the Tauride Palace. "It turns out that he was needed, it turns out that we loved him. His life has been unfairly difficult lately," Daniil Granin said at the funeral service.

"Today I am the head of the state, and therefore I cannot afford to speak sharply, but I will tell you my opinion in a generalized form. I believe that this is not just death, I believe that this is death. And this, of course, is the result of persecution" Vladimir Putin said that day.

Anatoly Sobchak is buried at the Nikolsky cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra.

Anatoly Sobchak was born on August 10, 1937 in Chita, like many children born in the country of the Soviets, he absorbed a bunch of nationalities. Paternal grandfather was Polish, grandmother Czech; maternal grandfather is Russian, grandmother is Ukrainian. In addition to Anatoly, there were three more children in the family. His father worked as an engineer on the railway, his mother worked as an accountant.

Despite this diversity, Sobchak always considered himself Russian - “for me, being Russian is thinking and speaking Russian, being proud of my country and its contribution to world heritage, and ashamed of the Chechen war, Chernobyl, abandoned collective farm fields and the poverty of the people, whose country owns countless natural resources. Remember the victims of Stalinist repressions and interethnic conflicts. But above all, it's about faith! Faith in the peace, democracy and prosperity of Russia, which we must leave to our children and grandchildren.

Anatoly was one of four sons. When he was only two years old, the whole family moved to Uzbekistan. In 1941, Sobchak's father went to the front, and all the burdens of maintaining a family and raising children fell on the shoulders of his mother. This poverty and half-starved existence had big influence on the young Sobchak.

“When I was little, the rarest and most precious thing was food. I had many friends, good parents and pets, but I never had enough food. I still remember that constant feeling of hunger. Our only salvation was our goat, as we couldn't afford to keep a cow. My brothers and I went every day to collect grass. Once someone hit our goat with a stick, she got sick and died. You know, I have never cried so much in my life as I did that day,” Anatoly Aleksandrovich recalled.

He went through the hungry years and continued his studies, gaining authority and popularity among his peers. Even when he was a child, his peers gave him the nicknames "Professor" and "Judge" for his qualities, because he had a broad outlook and was fair in settling disputes. war time professors of Leningrad University, actors and writers were evacuated to Uzbekistan. Some of them turned out to be Sobchak's neighbors. The stories about Leningrad and university life impressed the boy so much that he decided that he must enter Leningrad State University.

student time

After graduating from high school, Sobchak entered the law faculty of Tashkent University. He studied there for one year, and then received a transfer to the Leningrad State University. He loved to study and very quickly was awarded a Lenin scholarship. At the same time, he married Nonna Gandzyuk, who also came to Leningrad to get an education. The young couple were very poor, but what they lacked in food or material goods they made up for in the bountiful cultural life of Leningrad, which Sobchak came to love as his hometown. After some time, Sobchak and his wife had a daughter, Maria, who later followed in her father's footsteps and became a lawyer. However, the marriage was unsuccessful and ended in divorce in 1977.

After the university, Sobchak was sent by distribution to work as a lawyer in the Stavropol Territory. Sobchak worked there for three years, and three years later, in 1962, he returned to Leningrad to defend his Ph.D. thesis and continue his work as a lawyer and teacher.

In 1973, he presented his doctoral dissertation, in which he put forward the ideas of the liberalization of the socialist economy and closer ties between state economy and the private market. His ideas were considered rather risky and his thesis was rejected. Sobchak later learned that he was blacklisted by the university due to his support for his former professor, who was fired after his daughter emigrated to Israel. Sobchak decided to postpone the defense of his doctoral thesis. When he felt that the situation had changed, he wrote another dissertation, successfully defended it in Moscow, and became a doctor of law in 1982.

In his alma mater, Sobchak founded and headed the first department of economic law in the USSR. He worked there until 1989, the time when he entered politics. Sobchak's knowledge, wisdom and teaching style made him very popular with students, and even when he later became the mayor of St. Petersburg, he continued to lecture at the university.

Companion Lyudmila Narusova

In 1975, Sobchak met Lyudmila Narusova, who was destined to become his second wife.

“I was divorced and my husband didn't want to give up the apartment my parents were paying for. It was a difficult situation and someone recommended a lawyer who taught at the university. I was told that he handled complex cases and had an out-of-the-box way of thinking. I went to the university to meet him and ended up having to wait a very long time for him. Then I saw how after the lecture, young pretty students crowded around him, who asked him questions and tried to flirt with him, and I thought that he would not help me. At that time, I had no idea that he, too, had gone through a divorce and knew firsthand about it.

We went to a cafe to discuss my situation. I was so upset that I started telling him everything about myself and my life and cried all the time. He listened to me and decided that he needed to talk to my husband. He had the gift of persuasion, and as a result my husband backed down.

To thank the lawyer for his help, I bought him a bouquet of chrysanthemums and prepared three hundred rubles in an envelope. It was money, a monthly salary of an assistant professor. He took the flowers and returned the money, saying - you are so pale. Why don't you go to the market and buy yourself some fruit. I was very offended by this. Three months later we met at some party and he didn't even remember me. And it was even worse. I did my best to make sure he never forgets me again! We started dating, however we had a rather large age gap between us - he was thirty-nine and I was only twenty-five. We dated for 5 years and he seemed in no rush to propose. However, in 1980 we finally got married and a year later our daughter Ksenia, ”recalls Lyudmila Borisovna.

It is unlikely that the happy father guessed that a few decades later, his daughter would surpass him in popularity and even be a candidate for the presidency of the Russian Federation. However, when he took her from the hospital, all he dreamed about was to live long enough to celebrate her eighteenth birthday and had no idea that he would die, just a couple of months after Ksenia Anatolyevna celebrated her 18th birthday.

This was the second marriage, and the late Sobchak adored his wife and admitted that he owed her his life. She became more than just a wife; she was his companion, fighting for her husband's cause and even for his very existence. He later wrote that during his severe persecution, her loyalty, courage and support won her great respect even from his enemies. Living and working so close to Sobchak, Lyudmila also joined politics, being elected to the State Duma in St. Petersburg in 1995.

From university life to politics

Meanwhile, Mikhail Gorbachev becomes the leader of the Soviet Union, as a result of the total reform of the country - perestroika, which marked the beginning of the democratization of power. In 1989, Sobchak was elected a people's deputy of the USSR in the first democratic elections in the country.

A talented lawyer and professor, he was also talented in politics. He was appointed head of the parliamentary investigation into the execution of peaceful demonstrators in Tbilisi in 1989 - his report exposed the gross misconduct of the Interior Ministry and KGB against people. His direct questions during the cross-examination of the then Soviet Premier Nikolai Ryzhkov regarding the orders and actions of all state officials were broadcast throughout the country, which was unheard of just a few years ago.

Mayor of St. Petersburg

In 1990, Sobchak was elected chairman of the Leningrad City Council. The following year, in the general election of the head of the city, he was elected the first mayor of Leningrad. On the same day, a referendum was held on the return of Leningrad to the historical name of St. Petersburg.

Sobchak quickly assembled a strong team of young professionals who were also talented managers. Most of the people on his team are now political elite Russia. One of his assistants was former student Dmitry Medvedev, and the post of vice-mayor Vladimir Putin. Sobchak sincerely loved St. Petersburg, sought to improve its image throughout the world and restore its status as the cultural capital of Russia.

Meanwhile, a coup by Communist Party supporters in August 1991 gave Sobchak the opportunity to go down in history. While Boris Yeltsin, President of Russia, gathered and coordinated the opposition in Moscow, Sobchak did the same in St. Petersburg. He boldly confronted the security forces and convinced them not to bring the army into the city.

The coup failed Soviet Union broke up in late 1991, and Sobchak became the second most popular political leader of Russia after Yeltsin. His legal education and experience allowed him to practically write the new Constitution of post-Soviet Russia. However, Sobchak was perhaps too soft a politician and could not use his immediate popularity after the coup to move to a higher level of politics. Instead, he fell into the trap of local St. Petersburg politics and began to lose popularity after failing to curb organized crime in the city. Soon accusations of corruption and financial dishonesty began to appear in the press.

From the peak of popularity to criminal prosecution

In early 1996, Sobchak's competitors launched a full campaign to discredit him, organized by his assistant Vladimir Yakovlev. Scandals involving Sobchak and his team appeared in the press - they were accused of mismanaging city resources, resulting in losses of hundreds of millions of dollars. Sobchak was accused of illegal privatization of property in prestigious areas of St. Petersburg. Some felt that Sobchak and his popularity were too inconvenient for Boris Yeltsin, whose second presidential term would have been in jeopardy if Sobchak had risen and decided to run.

“I would not even want my enemies to experience what my family and I have experienced over the past four years. From a person with an unblemished reputation, in an instant I turned into a corrupt official, I was persecuted and accused of all mortal sins, ”Anatoly Sobchak later wrote in his book A Dozen Knives in the Back.

He lost the election by just over 1%, but the persecution did not stop. Sobchak had already had two heart attacks and felt very ill. In 1997, investigators from the prosecutor's office tried to forcibly bring him in for questioning - he was supposed to be a witness in a corruption case. His wife insisted that Sobchak was too ill to be interrogated, but the investigators did not believe her and tried to take him away by force. She called an ambulance, and the doctors diagnosed a third heart attack in Anatoly Alexandrovich.

After the hospital in November 1997, Anatoly and his wife left for France. He lived in Paris for 2 years, received medical treatment, taught at the Sorbonne and worked with the archives.

Recovery

Sobchak returned to St. Petersburg in July 1999. His most ardent persecutors were either fired or arrested on criminal charges. In October 1999, Sobchak received an official notification from the Prosecutor General's Office that the criminal case against him was closed. All accusations published by the press were found to be unfounded. Sobchak regained his honor by winning cases against those who published slanderous materials about him.

In December 1999, Sobchak ran for the State Duma. However, the lack of support played a decisive role, and tough competition with the city authorities - Sobchak lost, losing only 1.2%.

On December 31, 1999, Boris Yeltsin resigned, Vladimir Putin, Sobchak's former protégé, was named acting president until the March elections. In turn, Putin appointed Sobchak as his confidant in Kaliningrad, where he traveled on 15 February.

Death and legacy

Five days later, on February 20, 2000, Sobchak was found dead. Immediately, the opinions of Sobchak's wife and relatives were heard in the press that it was a murder, but an autopsy found that acute heart failure was the cause of death.

Rumors about the murder appeared immediately, but the prosecutor's office of the Kaliningrad region opened a criminal case on the fact of murder (poisoning) only in May. An autopsy performed in St. Petersburg showed the absence of both alcohol and poisoning. In August, the prosecutor's office dropped the case. Although the brother of Anatoly Alexander Alexandrovich is still sure that his brother was killed.

Sobchak was a member of a generation that had a political phase in both Soviet and post-Soviet Russia. Having gained mass popularity during perestroika, he became one of the ideologists and political leader of the capitalist reforms. In a sense, Sobchak's death, which coincided with the end of Yeltsin's presidency, ended the romantic period of Russia's democratization.