![]() Body of Leonid Brezhnev, lying in state at the Pillar (Column) Hall of the House of the Unions | |
Date | 10–15 November 1982 (41 years ago) |
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Location | Moscow, Soviet Union |
Organized by | Yuri Andropov |
Participants |
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Burial | Kremlin Wall Necropolis |
Lying in state | Pillar (Column) Hall House of the Unions |
Honor guard | Taman Division Kantemir Division |
Funeral reception hosts | Yuri Andropov Nikolai Tikhonov Andrei Gromyko Vasili Kuznetsov |
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First, then General Secretary of the CPSU
Foreign policy Media gallery |
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On 10 November 1982, Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev, the third General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) and the fifth leader of the Soviet Union, died at the age of 75 after suffering heart failure following years of serious ailments. His death was officially acknowledged on 11 November simultaneously by Soviet radio and television. Brezhnev was given a state funeral after three full days of national mourning, then buried in an individual tomb on Red Square at the Kremlin Wall Necropolis. Yuri Andropov, Brezhnev's eventual successor as general secretary, was chairman of the committee in charge of managing Brezhnev's funeral, held on 15 November 1982, five days after his death.
The funeral was attended by forty‑seven heads and deputy heads of state, twenty‑three heads and deputy heads of government, forty heads of foreign government ministries, six leaders of foreign legislatures, and five princes. Most of the world's Communist party-led nations in 1982 were represented; forty‑seven Communist parties from countries where the party was not in power also sent representatives. United States President Ronald Reagan sent Vice President George H. W. Bush. Eulogies were given by Yuri Andropov, Dmitry Ustinov, Anatoly Alexandrov, Viktor Pushkarev, and Alexei Gordienko.