Eduard Shevardnadze, the former Georgian president and Soviet foreign minister, died on July 7 at the age of 86. This is a look at the political career of the man who was considered a hero in the West for helping end the Cold War as the last Soviet foreign minister but who suffered a dramatic fall from grace as president of his native Georgia.
Eduard Shevardnadze: From Cold War Hero To Fallen Leader
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Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev and Eduard Shevardnadze at a 1981 meeting in Tbilisi dedicated to the 60th anniverary of the establishment of the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic.
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Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze and other officials welcome U.S. President Ronald Reagan and First Lady Nancy Reagan in 1988 in Moscow.
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Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze meets with British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in 1989 in London.
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President Eduard Shevardnadze tours the combat zone during the 1993 Georgian-Abkhaz war.
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Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze being treated for injuries sustained in a bomb attack on his motorcade in 1995 in Tbilisi.
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Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze visits Boris Yeltsin at the Russian president's summer residence in the Black Sea resort of Sochi in 1994.
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Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze gestures during a news conference in Tbilisi in 1998.
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Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma shakes hands with his Georgian counterpart Eduard Shevardnadze on arrival in Tbilisi in 2000.
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Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze toasts with a glass of freshly extracted oil as he visits an oil field in Taribana near Tbilisi, during his 2000 election campaign.
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Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze speaks to his wife Nanuli as their daughter Manana, two granddaughters, and daughter-in-law stand behind them during the 2000 presidential inauguration ceremony in Tbilisi.
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Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze meets with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Chisinau, Moldova, in 2002.
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President Eduard Shevardnadze minutes before being driven out of the parliament chamber by angered opposition leaders in November 2003.
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Former President Eduard Shevardnadze speaks to RFE/RL's Tbilisi Bureau Chief Marina Vashakmadze in October 2009.