Vladimir Lukin

Vladimir Lukin’s route to diplomacy began in historical scholarship. Born in Omsk in 1937, he was raised by relatives after his parents were subjected to political repression. He graduated from Moscow’s pedagogical institute in 1959, worked in museums and research institutes, and spent part of the 1960s in Prague on the journal Problems of Peace and Socialism. According to HSE’s account of his career, he was recalled after opposing the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. ^{1, 2}

He subsequently worked for almost two decades at the Institute for U.S. and Canadian Studies before entering the Foreign Ministry in 1987. Elected to the Russian republic’s parliament in 1990, he chaired its foreign affairs committee and participated in work on treaties with former Soviet republics. His Washington ambassadorship in 1992–1994 combined the transition from Soviet diplomacy with the practical work of establishing Russia’s new international financial relationships. ^{1, 2}

On 16 November 1992 Lukin signed a $600 million World Bank rehabilitation loan for the Russian Federation. The agreement allocated $250 million to support private sector imports through Moscow’s foreign currency exchange and $350 million to priority imports in health, agriculture, energy, and transport. ³

Lukin helped found Yabloko in 1993, returned to parliamentary leadership, and served as Russia’s human rights commissioner from 2004 to 2014. He also led the Russian Paralympic Committee. In an inaugural HSE lecture in December 2014, he argued for Russia’s development alongside Europe and for citizens able to act independently of the state, while acknowledging both achievements and failures in his work as ombudsman. ^{4, 2}