Yeltsin Seizes Power (1993)

Today's Golden Oldie is from March 21 1993. Fifteen years ago this month. On March 20,1993 Russian President Boris Yeltsin announced that he was going to assume "special powers" ...which prompted this snide and cynical Dry Bones cartoon. At the time, Yeltsin was seen by many as Russia's hope for democracy.

Two years earlier he'd been elected president of the "Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic" (and he would go on to dissolve the Soviet Union).

Yeltsin's battle for "control" continued until October 1993 when he ordered Russian tanks to shell the Russian parliament.

In 1999 Yeltsin resigned, turning the presidency over to Vladimir Putin.

Boris Yeltsin
Father of Russian Democracy?