1. Sergei Kuzhugetovich Shoigu was born on 21 May 1955 and is a Russian politician and military officer who has served as secretary of the Security Council since 2024.
69 Facts About Sergei Shoigu
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Sergei Shoigu served as Minister of Defence of Russia from 2012 to 2024.
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Sergei Shoigu was the Minister of Emergency Situations from 1991 to 2012.
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Sergei Shoigu briefly served as the governor of Moscow Oblast in 2012.
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Sergei Shoigu was entrusted with the task of supervising the invasion of Ukraine since 2022.
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Alexandra Sergei Shoigu grew up in the Donbas town of Kadiivka and had traumatizing experiences while under detention of the German occupation forces during World War II.
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Kuzhuget Sergei Shoigu rose to secretary of the Tuvan Regional Committee of the Communist Party, becoming a major figure in the Communist power structure of the republic.
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Sergei Shoigu graduated in 1977 with a degree in civil engineering.
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Sergei Shoigu worked in construction projects nationwide for the next decade, advancing from low levels to become an executive.
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In 1988, Sergei Shoigu became a minor functionary in the Abakan branch of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, and then in the Komsomol for a few years.
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In 1990, Sergei Shoigu moved to Moscow from Siberia, and was appointed deputy chairman of the State Architecture and Construction Committee of the Russian Federation, assisted by his father's connections.
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Future president Boris Yeltsin had held a similar position in the Construction Committee, and had come from a civil engineering and party background, so Sergei Shoigu gained Yeltsin's trust.
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The Rescue Corps replaced the previous Soviet civil defense system and soon absorbed the 20,000-strong militarized Civil Defense Troops of the Ministry of Defense, with Sergei Shoigu being appointed chairman of the State Committee of the Russian Federation for Civil Defense, Emergency Situations, and Disaster Response.
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Civil Defense remained a quasi-military organization in continuation of Soviet practice and Sergei Shoigu was politically involved, such as an unsuccessful attempt to evacuate Russian-backed Afghan president Mohammad Najibullah in 1992 and the intended distribution of weapons from the Civil Defense stocks to Yeltsin supporters during the October 1993 coup.
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In keeping with the militarized nature of Russian civil defense, Sergei Shoigu received the rank of major general in 1993, and was promoted swiftly to lieutenant general in 1995, colonel general in 1998, and to army general, in practice the highest Russian military rank, in 2003.
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Sergei Shoigu became popular because of his hands-on management style and high visibility during emergency situations, such as floods, earthquakes and acts of terrorism.
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Unity allowed for the rise of Vladimir Putin to president and in 2001 was combined into the ruling United Russia party, although Sergei Shoigu was the only delegate to vote against the merger.
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In 1999, Sergei Shoigu was awarded Russia's most prestigious state award: Hero of the Russian Federation.
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On 6 November 2012, Sergei Shoigu was appointed Minister of Defence by Putin, succeeding Anatoly Serdyukov, who had implemented sweeping reforms of the Russian Armed Forces in response to performance in the Russo-Georgian War.
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Serdyukov was unpopular with senior military leaders and seen by them as a civilian with no military background, something that Sergei Shoigu attempted to address by symbolically tying himself to the military through wearing an army general's uniform, reviving historical units dissolved under the reforms, and reinstating officials dismissed by Serdyukov.
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Furthermore, Sergei Shoigu appealed for support for reform within the army rather than taking a confrontational stance, appointed deputy ministers of defense from the military, and removed Serdyukov-appointed civilian tax service officials from the top echelons of the Ministry of Defense.
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In November 2012, Sergei Shoigu decided to resurrect the tradition of Suvorov and Nakhimov cadets participating in the 9 May parade.
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In July 2013 Sergei Shoigu ordered commanders to begin every morning in the barracks with a rendition of the Russian anthem, to compile an obligatory military-patriotic book reading list and to take responsibility for the preparation of demobilization albums.
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From early 2013 the Sergei Shoigu ministry made use of snap exercises as a means to ensure combat readiness of the Eastern Military District, the Western Military District, and the Central Military District.
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In October 2016 Sergei Shoigu hosted 56 representatives from 31 different OSCE nations, with Sergei Shoigu stating that the observers "had a chance to see with their own eyes that Russia had fully implemented its obligations on ensuring confidence and security in Europe".
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Sergei Shoigu was accused of helping to form "illegal military groups" in Eastern Ukraine who at the time fought against the Ukrainian army.
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In July 2018 Sergei Shoigu warned that the Poroshenko administration of Ukraine was not fulfilling the Minsk agreements which were signed in order to end the war in Donbas.
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On 16 December 2015, speaking to the members of the State Duma behind closed doors, Sergei Shoigu mentioned the possibility of the Russian forces "reaching the Euphrates" in Syria.
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In June 2016, Russia Today, while reporting minister Sergei Shoigu's visit to Hmeymim air base, showed RBK-500 ZAB-2.5SM incendiary cluster bombs being loaded onto Russian airplanes.
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Several hours later, Sergei Shoigu said the troops had already begun to return.
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On 26 December 2017, Sergei Shoigu said that Russia had set about "forming a permanent grouping" at the Tartus naval facility and the Hmeymim airbase, after Putin approved their structure and personnel strength.
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Sergei Shoigu said in August 2021 that Russia had tested 320 new weapons over the course of its campaign in Syria.
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Sergei Shoigu was reappointed as defence minister in 2018 in the Medvedev second government.
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Sergei Shoigu was reappointed as defence minister in 2020 in the Mishustin government.
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On 29 August 2021, Sergei Shoigu was recorded as saying that "Russia doesn't consider Ukraine as threat", while he expressed the hope that the situation in Ukraine would ultimately change and the "nationalist mayhem" would be stopped.
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Sergei Shoigu said that the Ukrainians "are not just our neighbors, we are a single people".
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On 11 February 2022, Sergei Shoigu met UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace.
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Sergei Shoigu denied that Russia was planning an invasion of Ukraine.
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Sergei Shoigu said the purpose of the invasion "is to protect the Russian Federation from the military threat posed by Western countries, who are trying to use the Ukrainian people in the fight against our country".
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At the 10th Moscow Conference on International Security in August 2022, Sergei Shoigu hosted 35 defense ministers from Asia, Africa and Latin America.
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Sergei Shoigu described South Africa as a "friendly state" and that South Africa's support has helped counter NATO pressure on Russia.
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On 21 September 2022, Sergei Shoigu said in a televised speech that Russia was not so much at war with Ukraine and the Ukrainian army as with the "collective West" and NATO.
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In September 2022, Sergei Shoigu claimed that 5,397 Russian soldiers had been killed in the war in Ukraine.
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Sergei Shoigu said that the 2022 Russian mobilization is being carried out to control "already liberated territories" in Ukraine.
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Sergei Shoigu said the mobilized people could only be sent to combat zones after "training and combat coordination".
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On 1 November 2022, Sergei Shoigu admitted that the Russian military was destroying Ukrainian energy facilities.
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On 21 December 2022, Sergei Shoigu said that the war in Ukraine would continue in 2023 "until the tasks are completed".
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Sergei Shoigu declared that victory was "inevitable" and claimed that Russian troops were fighting what he called "neo-Nazism and terrorism".
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On 18 April 2023, Sergei Shoigu met with Chinese Defence Minister Li Shangfu in Moscow.
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Sergei Shoigu said that their countries' military cooperation was a "stabilising" force in the world.
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On 6 June 2023, Sergei Shoigu said that Ukrainian "offensive attempts were thwarted, the enemy was stopped, Russian soldiers and officers showed courage and heroism in the battles", while claiming Ukraine had suffered "significant and incomparable casualties".
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On 20 June 2023, Sergei Shoigu stated that the Ukrainian counteroffensive began on June 4, and since then Ukraine had launched 263 attacks on Russian positions, all of which have been unsuccessful, and that Russian forces had lost no territory or settlements.
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Sergei Shoigu met with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and North Korean Defense Minister Kang Sun-nam.
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On 12 May 2024, soon after Putin's re-election, Sergei Shoigu replaced Nikolai Patrushev as Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation.
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On 5 August 2024 Sergei Shoigu visited Tehran for high-level meetings with the new Pezeshkian government, the General Staff of Iran and members of Iran's Supreme National Security Council.
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Sergei Shoigu was sanctioned by the UK government in 2022 in relation to the Russo-Ukrainian War.
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Sergei Shoigu was born to Kuzhuget Sereevich Shoigu and Alexandra Yakovlevna Shoigu.
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Sergei Shoigu later worked in the Communist Party and for the Soviet authorities.
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Sergei Shoigu was the secretary of the Tuva Party Committee.
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Sergei Shoigu retired with the rank of first deputy chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Tuva ASSR.
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Sergei Shoigu spent six years as the editor of the newspaper Pravda.
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Sergei Shoigu wrote the novels Time and People, Feather of the Black Vulture, Tannu Tuva: the Country of Lakes and Blue Rivers.
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Sergei Shoigu's mother Alexandra was born in the village of Yakovlev in the Oryol Oblast.
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Sergei Shoigu was repeatedly elected deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Tuva ASSR.
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Sergei Shoigu is president of the business tourism company Expo-EM.
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Sergei Shoigu is alleged to have an affair with Elena Shebunova from the early 2000s until 2017.
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Sergei Shoigu enjoys studying the history of Russia, especially Peter the Great's time and the era between 1812 and 1825.
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Sergei Shoigu enjoys carpentry, and has shown some of his work to Putin.
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Sergei Shoigu stated in 2008 that he was baptized in the Russian Orthodox Church at the age of five, rebutting rumors that he was a practitioner of shamanism or Buddhism like many Tuvans.