Biography
Elena Bonnere was considered one of the most famous human rights defenders and dissidents of the 20th century. On the fate of the woman who passed the Great Patriotic War and entered into the ranks of the CPSU, influenced the events of Prague Spring and acquaintance with the future husband - Academician Andrei Sakharov. The late phase of the biography was devoted to public activities, which concluded in the criticism of military conflicts that broke out on the territory of the former Soviet Union, and the support of Russian and foreign democratic movements that united thousands of people.Childhood and youth
Biography of Elena Georgievna Bonnere began in 1923 in Soviet Turkestan. At birth, the girl was called Lusik Levonna Kocharian.
Mother, Ruth Grigorievna Bonnere, a representative of Jewish nationality, was a member of the Communist Party. In the late 1937th, a woman was arrested and sentenced to eight years of correctional work under Article 58-1 of the Criminal Code. About the biological father, Armenian Levon Sarkisovich Kocharian (Kocochah), is unknown almost nothing.
Stephim, Gevork Sarkisovich Alikhanyan, in early 1920s headed the secretariat of the Central Committee of the CP (b) of the Republic of Armenia, later he held the responsible party posts in the district committees of Leningrad and Moscow. In the late 1930s, a significant polymat worker was repressions and shot. Elena remained without both parents by the fault of the NKVD staff.
Together with the younger brother, the orphaned girl moved to the northern capital of the USSR to her grandmother. The relatives, who organized the evacuation, took care that children would not fall into an educational institution for descendants of the Motherland's traitors, little differed from prison.
Bonnere went to the usual school and visited the optional classes in literature. Despite the "bad" heredity, she was taken to Komsomol. In high school, after refusal to renounce the mother and stepfather, the native of Turkestan was excluded from the youth organization. The girl had to work as a cleaner in the housing and operational office, so as not to starve.
Having received a certificate of maturity, Elena decided to go in the footsteps of the aunt, bibliographer and local injury Anna Gdalievna Bonnere, and entered the Filology Faculty of Pedagogical Institute. A. I. Herzen. In parallel, she was trained at the Department of Medicine and received a profession for the years of the Great Patriotic War.
War years
In 1941, Bonnere as a military service called in the ranks of the Red Army. A 18-year-old student helped the doctors of the sanitary "flying" - the railway composition, transporting the wounded from Leningrad to the Vologda region. During the airline Elena received a serious injury and spent several months in hospitals.Running on his feet, the girl returned to the war zone in the role of a senior nurse specialized train. The heroine received her epaulets of Lieutenant, saving soldiers and officers. Victory Day The health worker with an incomplete literary education celebrated in the Austrian city of Innsbruck.
Returning to the territory of the USSR, the experienced sister of Mercy became the deputy head of the medical team of the Sapper battalion, which guarded the Karelian-Finnish direction. At the end of the summer of 1945, the daughter of the repressed Armenian and the Jewish was demobilized and recognized as disabled. In the late 1980s, the government awarded it by the Order of Patriotic War II degree.
Career and Human Rights Activities
The conflict with the Hitler's Germany in his youth made Elena refuse the career of the writer and choose the medical case as a profession. In 1953, she graduated from the 1st Leningrad Medical Institute and became a therapist, a pediatrician, and then the head of the Moscow specialized school and the mentor of the young.
Unrealized abilities were useful for writing articles for the "Neva" and "Youth" magazines, as well as participation in the preparation of Almanaci "The actors who died at the fronts of the Patriotic War" and the books "Vsevolod Bagritsky. Diaries, letters, poems. " In addition, the participant in the Great Patriotic War was texts for radio broadcasts, edited publications for the publishing house "Medicine", was a freelance lit consultant in the Union of Writers of the USSR.
In the late 1960s, Bonnere changed dramatically. The occasion to the revaluation of values was the events of Prague Spring, which led to reforms and decentralization of power in Czechoslovakia. Having stayed for several years a member of the Communist Party, the woman left her ranks and became a regular participant in the processes on dissidents.
During the trip to Kaluga, where Boris Willy and Revolt Pimenova, Elena met Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov, who had a trip to Kaluga. With the support of the developer of thermonuclear weapon, she put her hand to the transfer to the West of the journalist Arrested for the anti-Soviet political views of the publicist Eduard Kuznetsov.
In 1974, Bonnere helped academician to establish a charity foundation for children of political prisoners. After a short period of time, it represented one of the leaders of the human rights movement at the presentation of the Nobel Prize of the Peace and was present in the establishment of a public group to promote the implementation of Helsinki agreements in the USSR.
Having been linking in the city of Gorky, the native of Turkestan fell under the close attention of the staff of the State Security Committee. The apartment was regularly searched, subjected to the persecution of relatives and friends. Despite this, Elena Georgievna retained the presence of the spirit and since the late 1980s, he became the initiator of the emergence of such clubs and associations, as the Memorial and Moscow Tribune. In the 1990s, she was a member of the Commission on Human Rights under President Boris Yeltsin, in 2000 spent on the side of the Protection of the Media-Bridge group and journalists of the NTV television company.
The last stage of life was associated with the United States of America. Bonnere settled in Boston next to his own children. Because of the ocean, DSSIDEnta condemned the position of Russia in relation to the exacerbated political situation in the Republic of South Ossetia. She joined the group of citizens who demanded the resignation of President Vladimir Putin and signed under the petition of Andrei Pionkovsky, published on the website "Putin should leave."
Personal life
In early youth, Elena Georgievna had no time to think about his personal life. Having survived the Great Patriotic War, she was combined with Marriage with Ivan Vasilyevich Semenov and gave birth to two children - Daughter Tatiana and son Alexei, who claimed the status of US citizens from the late 1970s.The Soviet scientist Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov became the second of legal husbands. From the 1972th, a couple was engaged in public projects together, and after the death of the spouse, the widow tried to perpetuate the memory of academician by creating international non-governmental organizations that were a public commission and the nominal fund.
Death
The cause of the death of his wife Andrei Sakharov was the ischemic heart disease. Bonnere left life in Boston in 2011.
According to the emergence of the official funeral, there was no official funeral in the United States. After a farewell ceremony, the body was cremated, and the urn with dust transported to Moscow and buried in a cemetery next to the graves of her husband, mother and younger brother.
Awards and Prize
- 1988 - Order of Patriotic War II degree
- 1991 - Professor's memory premium Rafto
- 1993 - Award "For Freedom Press"
- 2000 - Hannah Award Rant
- 2009 - Commander Cross Orden of Merit to the Republic of Poland
- Honorary Doctor of Rights of American and European Universities
- Raoul Wallenberg International Foundation Prize
- Medal of Trumana Freedom - Reagan