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Swedish top diplomat says Gorbachev gave hope for another future

The USSR’s first and only president passed away on August 30 at the age of 91

STOCKHOLM, August 31. /TASS/. First Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev gave the youth the hope for another future without repressions and the Cold War, Sweden’s Foreign Minister Ann Linde said on Wednesday.

The USSR’s first and only president passed away on August 30 at the age of 91. He held the highest state office for six years.

"In 1985 Mikhail Gorbachev spoke at the World Youth Festival, tens and thousands of young people, including me, heard another tone, a hope for another future away from the repression and Cold War. He made a difference," the foreign minister wrote on her Twitter.

Gorbachev is renowned for proclaiming a new course almost immediately after his appointment as Secretary General of the Communist Party’s Central Committee in 1985. He then headed the USSR Supreme Soviet. Gorbachev proposed establishing the post of president and abolished the article of the Constitution on the leading role of the Communist Party. He coined such words as ‘perestroika’ and ‘glasnost’ that entered many languages at the time.

Gorbachev laid down his powers as the USSR president on December 25, 1991 and the Soviet Union ceased to exist at the time. However, his labor record kept at the Gorbachev Foundation has no entry that he stepped down as the head of state.

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