Andrei Kozyrev

Andrei Vladimirovich Kozyrev (Russian: Андрей Владимирович Козырев; born 27 March 1951) is a Russian politician and businessman who was the Minister of Foreign Affairs under President Boris Yeltsin, during the Russian SFSR from 1990 and during the Russian Federation from 1992, in office until 1996. Kozyrev was seen as supporting Yeltsin's liberal democratic outlook and tried to develop Russia's foreign policy immediately after the fall of the Soviet Union to no longer see NATO as a threat, pursue integration with the West, and not assert itself in the former Soviet countries. Kozyrev's pro-Western and liberal foreign policy fell out of favor because of NATO expansion that began from 1995, and he was replaced by Yevgeny Primakov in early 1996, who represented Russian "security state" interests. Towards the end of his tenure Kozyrev took a more conservative position, arguing to Western diplomats that hardline nationalists were the alternative to the Yeltsin administration, and that NATO expansion risked encouraging nationalist politics within Russia. He was the Russian representative during the signing of the Oslo I and Oslo II Accords, and the Israel–Jordan peace treaty. Kozyrev had graduated from the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO) with a PhD in history before joining the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1974, holding various positions in it before being appointed foreign minister.