The first president of Ukraine Leonid Kravchuk died at the age of 88.
This information was confirmed to LB.ua by sources close to the ex-president.
“These events (the war in Ukraine - ed.) killed him. We believed till the end…”, added the source.
According to Ukrainian News, Kravchuk passed away at about 5 pm due to a long illness.
We are reminding, that in the last interview for LB on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the Independence of Ukraine Leonid Kravchuk emphasized that considers the biggest mistake “that I believed russia”.
The first President of Ukraine was born on 10 January 1934 in the village of Velykyi Zhytyn, Volyn Voivodeship (now Rivne region).
He graduated with a degree in Accounting from the Rivne Cooperative College of Economics and Law (now the Rivne Cooperative College of Economics and Law) where he studied the period from 1950 to 1953. He later graduated from Kyiv State University with a degree in Social Sciences (1958) and the Academy of Social Sciences. Central Committee of the CPSU (1970). He received the degree of Candidate of Economic Sciences.
Since 1958 - a member of the CPSU. From 1958 to 1960 he taught political economy at the Chernivtsi Financial College. From 1960 to 1967 he was a consultant-methodologist at the House of Political Education, a lecturer, assistant secretary, and head of the propaganda and agitation department of the Chernivtsi Regional Committee of the Communist Party.
In the period 1990-1991, he was a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party and Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine.
People's Deputy of Ukraine of X-XIV (including I-IV) convocations.
On 1 December 1991, Leonid Kravchuk was elected President of Ukraine in the first direct presidential election, gaining 61.6% of the vote.
In the early presidential elections of 1994 (which he agreed to under the pressure of mass riots in the summer of 1993) in the second round, he lost to Leonid Kuchma, gaining 45.1% of the vote.
He was elected People's Deputy in 1994 in the by-elections in the Terebovlya majority district in the Ternopil region. In 1998, while remaining non-partisan, he headed the electoral list of the Social Democratic Party of Ukraine (United). On the eve of the vote, he joined the SDPU (o) and brought it to the Verkhovna Rada.
Since October 1998 he has been a member of the Politburo and the Political Council of the SDPU (U). In the period 2002-2006, he headed the SDPU (U) faction in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine.
Since 1999 - co-chairman of the All-Ukrainian Union of Democratic Forces “Zlagoda”. In 2006, he topped the list of the opposition bloc “No”. According to the results of the election, he did not overcome the 3% barrier (1.1%).
In November 2004, he was deprived of the title of Doctor of Honor of the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy for his “non-civic position during the Orange Revolution”.
Leonid Kravchuk was the Honorary President of the International Public Association “Rivne Fellowship”. He is also the Honorary Chairman of the All-Ukrainian Fund for International Communication “Ukrainian People's Embassy” (since 1994). And since 2011 - Honorary President of the Perspective Ukraine Foundation.
In July 2020, on a voluntary basis, he became the head of the Ukrainian delegation to the Tripartite Contact Group for the Settlement of the russian-Ukrainian Conflict in Donbas. The relevant order № 424/2020 of 30 July was published on the President's website. He later resigned from the delegation due to health problems.
On 29 June 2021, Kravchuk underwent heart surgery. After the operation, he was in intensive care and connected to a ventilator. He has been undergoing rehabilitation since September.