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Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin died today in the Central Clinical Hospital as a result of a deteriorating cardio-vascular problem.

Boris Yeltsin, who clambered on to a tank to bury the Soviet Union, then led Russia falteringly through its first years of independence, died on Monday aged 76.

World leaders showered Yeltsin with tributes for bringing freedom and democracy to Russia after decades of totalitarian rule, and pushing through market reforms that though brutal have helped to turn Russia into a vibrant economy.

But he was resented by millions of Russians who lost their savings to his economic “shock therapy”, lost sons in his war against Chechen rebels and watched him — at times apparently drunk — blunder through international summits.

President Vladimir Putin, whom Yeltsin anointed as his heir before stepping down, ailing and out of touch, in the last hours of 1999, declared Wednesday a day of national mourning.

“A man has passed away thanks to whom a whole new epoch was born,” said Putin. “A new democratic Russia was born, a free state open to the world. A state in which power truly belongs to the people.”

Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet president, whom Yeltsin effectively ousted, offered a qualified tribute.

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