Kremlin video
Putin says farewell to Gorbachev’s coffin in a matter-of-fact manner
Vladimir Putin pays his last respects to former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev at the Central Hospital in Moscow
© DPA
Russian state media has released a video showing Putin paying his last respects to the late Mikhail Gorbachev at the open coffin. The staging is emphatically factual, as is the whole way of dealing with the unloved former head of state and party.
The whole video lasts 38 seconds. It shows Russian President Vladimir Putin entering the small memorial hall in the central hospital in Moscow to pay his last respects to former head of state and party leader Michael Gorbachev. The deceased is laid out in an open coffin, as is Russian tradition. Gorbachev died on Tuesday at the age of 91.
Putin carries a bouquet of red roses, which he places on the edge of the coffin. He pauses for a few moments, looks at Gorbachev’s portrait again, bows, grasps the coffin and crosses himself. Then it’s over. The staging seems factual and concise, but can be considered standard.
Due to courtesy
It is something else that Putin stays away from the funeral service. That says more about what Putin and many in Russia think of Gorbachev: not much, or even less. For many Russians he is considered the undertaker of the great Soviet Union. In the telegram to the family, Putin left it open how he assessed the influence and work of the deceased. Mikhail Gorbachev “was a politician and statesman who had a tremendous influence on the course of world history”. These are rather general words. They are probably due to politeness, like the visit to the open coffin in the video, but hardly benevolent.