Democracy rally after attempted coup in Moscow

USSR. Moscow. President of the RSFSR Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin (center) on the balcony of the House of Soviets of the RSFSR during a rally in defense of democracy after the failed attempt by members of the State Committee on the State of Emergency in the USSR to carry out a coup d'etat 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, members of the State Committee on the State of Emergency, led by Vice President of the USSR Gennady Ivanovich Yanayev, removed the president of the USSR from power and declared a state of emergency in the country. Alexander Chumichev/TASS