Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) -- On the night of 31 August, Mikhail Gorbachev, the first and last president of the USSR, the last general secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, died, TASS reported.

“Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev died this evening after a serious and long illness,” the Central Clinical Hospital reported.

Earlier, information appeared in the media that Mikhail Gorbachev had kidney problems. Periodically, the ex-president was taken to hemodialysis - extra-renal blood purification in acute and chronic renal failure.

Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev was the first face of the USSR from 1985 to 1991. The period of his reign includes such significant events for the country as the end of the Cold War, Perestroika (a large-scale attempt to reform the Soviet system), the collapse of the Soviet Union and the military Warsaw bloc, which for 36 years supported the bipolarity of world politics.

Gorbachev will be buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery in the capital, in a family burial next to his wife, a source familiar with the wishes of the politician’s relatives told the agency.