Attempted coup d'etat in the USSR in 1991

USSR. Moscow. Supporters of USSR President Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev and RSFSR President Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin near tanks standing near the House of Soviets of the RSFSR on Krasnopresnenskaya Embankment after the announcement of a state of emergency in the country. 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 USSR President from power and declared a state of emergency in the country. Valery Khristoforov, Alexander Chumichev/TASS