Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev (L) speaks to Viktor Chernomyrdin (R), President's adviser and former Prime Minister, after decorating him with the Service to the Fatherland order of the fourth grade in May 2010. Photo by EPA/BGNES
Former Russian prime minister Viktor Chernomyrdin, who created gas behemoth Gazprom, has died, the Kremlin said on Wednesday. He was 72.
Chernomyrdin was politically close to former president Boris Yeltsin and served as premier between 1992 and 1998.
President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin expressed their sympathies to his family.
After the end of his stint as Russia's ambassador to Ukraine last year, he acted as Medvedev's adviser and special representative on economic cooperation with members of the Commonwealth of Independent States.
As a former minister for the gas industry, he was a for a long time considered one of the country's most influential politicians. After the creation of Gazprom he was elected board chairman of the gas giant.