Leonid Kravchuk, the first president of Ukraine, has died aged 88, Ukrainian News Agency reports, citing the politician’s family.
Ukrainian lawmaker Iryna Herashchenko and former Commissioner of the President of Ukraine for Children's Rights Mykola Kuleba also reported that Kravchuk had died.
According to the agency, Kravchuk died after a long illness. In June 2021, he missed a session of the Ukrainian parliament timed to the country’s Constitution Day as he was in the hospital for heart surgery.
Kravchuk was the first president of independent Ukraine. He served as president from December 1991 until July 1994. He was a member of the Ukrainian parliament from 1994 until 2006.
In 1991, Kravchuk, together with the first President of Russia Boris Yeltsin and the first President of Belarus Stanislav Shushkevich, signed the Belavezha Accords on the demise of the USSR and the establishment of the Commonwealth of Indepedent States (CIS).
Last week, on May 4, Stanislav Shushkevich, the first leader of independent Belarus, died aged 87 after COVID-19 complications.
