Gorbachev: Little love for late Soviet leader in Russia's old empire

Mikhail Gorbachev was lionised by the West for lifting the Iron Curtain and ending the Cold War, but opinion is far more negative in Russia and much of its old communist empire.

One Russian state news agency commentator said he was proof that a leader's good intentions were capable of causing hell on earth for an entire country.

A friend and liberal media figure, Alexei Venediktov, said mournfully: "We've all been orphaned, just not everyone has realised it."

The Soviet Union's last leader may have given millions of people their freedom - but in his time in charge he still sent in troops to quell protests in the Baltic republics, Kazakhstan and the Caucasus.

And even though his mother had Ukrainian roots, Ukrainians never forgave him for supporting Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014.

There was little love lost between Gorbachev and Russia's current leader Vladimir Putin, whose verdict on the fall of the Soviet empire as the "greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [20th] Century" is well known.

Even the Russian president's statement was limited in its praise - saying Gorbachev had "deeply understood that reforms were necessary and sought to offer his own solutions to urgent problems".

By Will Vernon in Moscow

In Moscow we asked passers-by near a recently-rebranded McDonald's restaurant about Gorbachev's death and his legacy.

The American fast-food chain opened to great fanfare in Moscow in 1990, when he was leader of the Soviet Union and Russia was opening up to the world. Fast forward to 2022, and McDonald's has ceased all operations in Russia over the invasion of Ukraine. This country is now feeling increasingly isolated.

"I respected him," Marina told us. "For me, he was perestroika, hope, freedom. I'm very grateful to him." Others mentioned revolutionary new freedoms such as open borders, travel and study abroad, and freedom of the press.

But the Nobel Peace Prize winner was a controversial figure in Russia, and opinion on him is split. More liberal, pro-Western Russians say he was a great reformer who brought freedom to this country. Many remember the great economic hardships. The country itself finally fell apart in 1991, which even many liberal Russians describe as a disaster.

"It was a big mistake that the USSR fell apart, that [Gorbachev] couldn't do anything to save the Union," one man called Viktor told me, "and probably most people agree with me. Everything would be different now [if he had saved it]."

But some younger Russians seemed indifferent. One student admitted he didn't really know who Mikhail Gorbachev was. The world-changing events of the 1980s and 1990s are now a distant memory to many.

The war in Ukraine and an economic downturn are much more at the forefront of people's minds.

The big question in Russian media was whether the late leader would be honoured with a state funeral and if President Putin would take part.

TV channel NTV considered whether he was worthy of a monument, adding that Russians were ambivalent on the issue. Izvestia newspaper said pointedly he was the leader of a great country - which he had not managed to hold together.

By Oksana Antonenko, BBC Russian in Latvia

For the Baltic countries, Mikhail Gorbachev became a symbol of brutality when he sent in the military to suppress anti-Soviet protests in Lithuania and Latvia in January 1991.

Seven people lost their lives on the barricades in the Latvian capital, Riga, and another 14 were killed by Soviet troops trying to seize the TV tower in Vilnius.

Although Gorbachev favoured increased freedom, he never supported the idea of independence for any of the former Soviet republics. He never admitted giving the order for troops to attack pro-independence protesters, but couldn't prevent the violence.

His death has stirred up mixed feelings here.

Lithuanian Defence Minister Arvydas Anusauskas labelled the late leader a criminal with "no remorse", while the former head of Lithuania's independence movement, Vytautas Landsbergis, said he became a prisoner who was told what to say and what to do.

Latvian President Egils Levits said his country had become independent against Gorbachev's will - and the people of the Baltics had played a big role in the collapse of the USSR.

Gorbachev had shown no qualms about using force to quash dissent elsewhere too.

When thousands of protesters took to the streets in Soviet Kazakhstan in 1986, Soviet and local forces reacted with brutality, leaving an estimated 200 people dead.

There was bloodshed in the Caucasus as well. Soviet tanks rolled into the Georgian capital, Tbilisi, to quash pro-independence protests in April 1989, leaving 21 people dead, most of them women.

A crackdown on Azerbaijan's pro-independence movement in 1990 left 147 people dead. "Gorbachev was a rare villain who was hated both in Armenia and Azerbaijan," said Armenian pro-Russian blogger Mika Badalyan.

The story was rather different in East Germany, one of a number of communist states where independence movements were growing in 1989.

When Gorbachev visited East Berlin, he warned its communist leaders: "Danger doesn't wait for those who fail to respond to life." When protests against communist rule reached a crescendo in October 1989, he ordered Soviet troops not to leave base.

"Gorbachev made it possible for the [Berlin] wall to come down," Berliner Angelika told the BBC. "If anyone else had been president in Russia, this wouldn't have happened. Instead, we'd have seen tanks in the streets."

His role in German reunification was praised by today's democratic leaders, including Foreign Secretary Annalena Baerbock: "In defining moments of our history, Mikhail Gorbachev chose the path of peace and understanding and thereby contributed to the end of the Cold War."

Ex-chancellor Angela Merkel praised him for changing the world for the better and allowing a reunified Germany to join Nato.

There was little sympathy for the late Soviet president in Ukraine, where journalist Serhiy Sydorenko said he was "Ukraine-phobic".

Economist Serhiy Fursa said he would not have given freedom to Eastern Europe if he had had a choice: "The economy decided everything for him."

"He was 91 years old. Putin will not live that long," blogger Vyacheslav Ilchenko said.

Much of the reaction in Central and Eastern Europe contrasted his role in European history with Russia's current leader.

Slovak President Zuzana Caputova said the last Soviet leader "believed in a better Russia than we are seeing today".

In Poland, former Moscow correspondent Waclaw Radziwinowicz said he should be thanked for engaging with the West and helping to end the Cold War: "Be grateful to Gorbachev. What if the USSR was ruled in the 1980s by someone like Putin?"