Yegor Gaidar, Russian economist and politician, Prime Minister of Russia (b. 1956)
Yegor Timurovich Gaidar (Russian: Его́р Тиму́рович Гайда́р; pronounced [jɪˈɡor tʲɪˈmurəvʲɪtɕ ɡɐjˈdar]; 19 March 1956 – 16 December 2009) was a Soviet and Russian economist, politician, and author, and was the Acting Prime Minister of Russia from 15 June 1992 to 14 December 1992.
He was the architect of the controversial shock therapy reforms administered in Russia after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, which brought him both praise and harsh criticism. He participated in the preparation of the Bialowieza agreements. Many Russians held him responsible for the economic hardships that plagued the country in the 1990s that resulted in mass poverty and hyperinflation among other things, although liberals praised him as a man who did what had to be done to save the country from complete collapse. Jeffrey Sachs, director of Columbia University's Earth Institute, who advised the Russian government in the early 1990s, called Gaidar "the intellectual leader of many of Russia's political and economic reforms" and "one of the few pivotal actors" of the period.Gaidar died of pulmonary edema, provoked by myocardial ischemia on 16 December 2009.