Heydar Aliyev

He married Zarifa Aliyeva in 1948. His wife was a renowned ophthalmologist, academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Azerbaijan and professor. The couple had two children—one son and one daughter. Zarifa died of cancer in 1985.

He began to suffer from ill health during his later years. He had a major heart bypass operation in the US in 1999, followed by prostrate surgery and hernia operation later on. Due to his failing health he stepped down from presidency in October 2003. He died two months later on 12 December 2003 .

He was born on 10 May 1923 in Nakhchyvan City of Azerbaijan. His father was a railway worker.

He received his primary education from Nakhchivan Pedagogical School. He then attended the Azerbaijan Industrial Institute (now the Azerbaijan State Oil Academy) from 1939 to 1941, studying architecture.

From 1941 he headed the department at the People’s Commissariat of Internal Affairs of the Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic of Nakhchyvan. He joined the Azerbaijan SSR People's Commissariat for State Security (NKGB) in 1944.

The NKGB came to be known as Committee for State Security or the KGB in 1954 due to certain changes in government policies. Working there for many years he steadily rose through the positions to become a deputy chairman of Azerbaijani KGB in 1964, and its chairman in 1967.

In July 1969, at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, amidst a Soviet anti-corruption campaign, he was elected as the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan by Leonid Brezhnev.

He tried his best to bring down the level of corruption by sentencing a number of people accused of corruption to prison terms. In 1975 five people were sentenced to death for gross corruption. His policies were moderately successful in controlling corruption.

Under his leadership Soviet Azerbaijan also registered a considerable economic growth. But at the same time he also faced the public’s ire for his extravagant spending on gift-giving to other politicians in order to remain in their good books.

In 1997, he was honored with Ukraine's highest award, the Yaroslav Mudry Order "for outstanding contribution to the development of cooperation between Ukraine and the Republic of Azerbaijan and strengthening friendship between the Ukrainian and Azeri people"

The Order of St. Andrew, the highest order of chivalry of the Russian Empire, was bestowed upon him "for his great personal contribution to strengthening friendship and cooperation between Russia and Azerbaijan" in 2003.