Attempted coup d'etat in the USSR in 1991

USSR. Volgograd. Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Volgograd Regional Council of People's Deputies Ivan Petrovich Shabunin (second from right) speaks at a rally near the building of the regional executive committee on Lenin Avenue in support of democracy and USSR President Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev after the announcement of a state of emergency in the country during an attempted coup d'etat. In order to prevent the signing of the Union Treaty, which was supposed to replace the USSR with a new federation of sovereign states, representatives of the highest Soviet leadership, headed by USSR Vice President Gennady Ivanovich Yanayev, removed the president of the USSR from power and created the State Committee for the State of Emergency (GKChP). Eduard Kotlyakov/TASS