Rutskoi, Alexander Vladimirovich, << root SKOY, uhl yihk SAHN duhr vluh DYEE myih `raw` vyihch >> (1947-…), served as vice president of Russia from 1991 to 1993. He was elected with President Boris Yeltsin in Russia’s first presidential election. Yeltsin forced Rutskoi from office because Rutskoi opposed Yeltsin’s policies. From 1996 to 2000, Rutskoi served as governor of the Kursk region, in southwestern Russia.
Rutskoi was born in Kursk on Sept. 16, 1947. He became a military pilot. He was elected to Russia’s parliament in 1990. In 1991, after becoming vice president, he began to disagree openly with Yeltsin’s policies. He charged that Yeltsin and his advisers had no clear idea of how to improve the economy. He argued that their economic experiments were proving too costly for the Russian people. In 1992, Yeltsin stripped Rutskoi of nearly all responsibilities.
In September 1993, a commission headed by Yeltsin accused Rutskoi of corruption. Yeltsin suspended Rutskoi from office, but parliament declared the suspension unconstitutional. Yeltsin dissolved parliament. Parliament, in turn, voted to remove Yeltsin from office and to make Rutskoi acting president. A struggle for power between the two sides followed. Rutskoi and his allies barricaded themselves in the parliament building in Moscow. In early October, the military, on Yeltsin’s orders, forced Rutskoi and his allies out of the parliament building. Rutskoi and others were then arrested and jailed. Rutskoi was released from jail in 1994.
