Attempted coup d'etat in the USSR in 1991

USSR. Moscow. Participants in a rally at the House of Soviets of the RSFSR after the victory of democratic forces over members of the State Committee for the State of Emergency in the USSR (GKChP), who were attempting to carry out a coup 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 Vice President of the USSR Gennady Ivanovich Yanayev, removed USSR President Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev from power and created the State Committee for the State of Emergency. Alexander Chumichev/TASS