Breaking: Boris Yeltsin has passed away

Via the AP:

MOSCOW – Former President Boris Yeltsin, who engineered the final collapse of the Soviet Union and pushed Russia to embrace democracy and a market economy, has died, a Kremlin official said Monday. He was 76.

Kremlin spokesman Alexander Smirnov confirmed Yeltsin’s death, but gave no cause or further information.

A Communist Party leader in Ekaterinburg and later Moscow during the Soviet Union, Yeltsin became president of Russia in 1991.

Although Yeltsin initially was admired abroad for his defiance of the monolithic social system, many Russians will remember him mostly for presiding over the steep decline of their nation.

He was a contradictory figure, rocketing to popularity in the Communist era on pledges to fight corruption — but proving unable, or unwilling, to prevent the looting of state industry as it moved into private hands during his nine years as Russia’s first freely elected president.

SkyNews is showing video footage of Yeltsin and is providing running commentary on the news of his death.