Russian Church and State Unite to Farewell Yeltsin

Hundreds of mourners this morning filed past Boris Yeltsin's coffin, which has been lying in state since yesterday inside the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour.

Yeltsin's widow Naina and daughters Tatiana and Yelena sat in the front row. A four-strong honour guard stood next to Yeltsin's open coffin draped in a Russian tricolour.

The signs of years of ill health were harshly written on the face of Boris Yeltsin's face. It looked puffy, yellow and swollen.

Yeltsin, who died of heart failure on Monday, aged 76, was the Russian president who dismantled the Soviet Union.

The church was heavy with the smell of incense and candles. Orthodox priests sang hymns, as mourners trooped past in solemn file, some crossing themselves, others laying single carnations and red roses.

Today's ceremony is the first orthodox church-sanctioned funeral for a Russian head of state for more than a century. Since Soviet times, and Lenin's death in 1924, all Russian leaders have been buried near the Kremlin wall, with mourners proceeding across Red Square.

Yeltsin's funeral marks a distinct return to religious tsarist traditions, with his burial taking place later today at Moscow's bucolic and tranquil Novodevichy cemetery. The cemetery is best known as a resting place for the likes of playwright Anton Chekhov and composer Sergei Prokofiev.

The cemetery, close to the Moscow River, and next door to a baroque 16th and 17th century convent, was the traditional resting place for Russia's pre-revolutionary elite. It was also used as a graveyard in Soviet times for leading artists, scientists and statesmen.

The public queue to pay tribute to Boris Yeltsin stretched round the block this morning - with state-run TV channels screening the event live.

Scores of officials and government members flooded into the gold-domed cathedral at 12.30pm local time (9.30am BST) ahead of a funeral service later this afternoon.

Mourners included the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, the Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich and Viktor Chernomyrdin - Yeltsin's former prime minister.

There were also leading members of Vladimir Putin's United Russia party. Several hugged Yeltsin's widow Naina, as songs were chanted over Yeltsin's body, asking for God's mercy.

From time to time Yeltsin's daughter Tatiana tactfully re-arranged her mother's black veil. Russian TV pointed out that the mourners included representatives from both the Yeltsin 'team" - which used to run the Kremlin - and the Putin "team" - which still does.

A number of high profile foreigners also attended the funeral, including former US presidents Bill Clinton and George Bush Sr, and former British prime minister John Major.

The cathedral of Christ the Saviour was blown up by Joseph Stalin and rebuilt under Yeltsin in a symbol of Russia's post-Soviet rebirth.

Throughout the night, mourners filed past Yeltsin's open coffin at the cathedral to pay their respects to the man who finally led Russia away from communism.

The country has been split over its assessment of the late president's legacy, some praising him for bringing freedom and helping defeat a coup attempt by former Soviet hardliners, others blaming him for handing over state assets to oligarchs and damaging the country's name through drunken buffoonery.

Communist MPs expressed their feelings today by refusing to stand for a moment of silence in Yeltsin's memory in parliament.

"We will never give honour to the destroyer of fatherland," communist MP Viktor Ilyukhin was quoted as saying by the RIA-Novosti news agency.

However, Yeltsin's successor as president, Vladimir Putin, ordered the state funeral and has decreed that flags around the country should fly at half mast today, with TV entertainment programmes taken off the air.

Marina Shetakova, a student who came to view Yeltsin's body, summed up this attitude.

"My mum thought Yeltsin was great because he gave us democracy," she told the Reuters news agency. "My dad hates him because he thinks he ruined a great country. I came here to have a last chance to see this man."

Former British prime minister John Major is attending the funeral in a personal capacity, describing Yeltsin after his death as "a man of great courage and conviction" with whom he had struck up a friendship that outlasted both their periods in power.

Among other mourners were Polish trade union leader-turned politician Lech Walesa and Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet leader, whose reform attempts began a wave of open dissatisfaction with the system.

Becoming Russia's first elected president in 1991, Yeltsin became known around the world later that year as he mounted a tank in Moscow to help see off the coup attempt. Two years later he ordered Russian tanks to fire on their own parliament, when the building was occupied by hardline opponents.

His eight years in office saw the break up of the Soviet Union, accompanied by economic reforms, which for many Russians appeared to descend into anarchy, sparking the tighter state controls of the Putin era.

Yeltsin's presidency was also marred by economic meltdown, occasional political chaos, a costly war against rebels in Chechnya and drink-fuelled gaffes.