Stepashin, Sergei Vadimovich, << styeh PAH shihn, sehr GAY vahd DEEM uh vihch >> (1952-…), has held several important posts in Russia. He served as prime minister for several months in 1999.
Stepashin was born on March 2, 1952, on a Soviet military base in Lüshun, China. The Soviet Union, of which Russia was a part, existed from 1922 to 1991. Stepashin joined the Soviet Union’s internal security agency after graduating in 1973 from a political and military school run by the Ministry of Internal Affairs. In 1981, he graduated from the V. I. Lenin Higher Military Political Academy. He earned a doctor of law degree in 1986.
In 1994, Stepashin became head of the Federal Counterintelligence Service (now the Federal Security Service) and helped increase its powers. Also in 1994, he helped direct an invasion of Chechnya, a Russian republic fighting for independence. President Boris N. Yeltsin fired Stepashin in 1995 for his poor handling of a Chechen hostage crisis, which ended in more than 100 deaths. But in 1997, Yeltsin appointed Stepashin justice minister and, a year later, minister of internal affairs. In 1999, Yeltsin elevated Stepashin to prime minister in May, then removed him in August.
