Biography
Yakunin's father was a pilot of the USSR Border Troops of the KGB.
As a child Yakunin lived in Estonia, Pärnu.
In 1972 Yakunin graduated from the Leningrad Mechanical Institute where he studied aircraft construction. In 1972-1975 he worked in the State Institute for Applied Chemistry in Leningrad.
After completing his military service (1975-1977), he worked in the State Committee for International Trade of the Sovmin (Council of Ministers) until 1982.
In 1982-1985 he was one of the heads of the Foreign Relations Department in the Ioffe Physico-Technical Institute.
Between 1985 and 1991, Yakunin was part of the Soviet diplomatic mission to the United Nations, since 1988, as the Mission's First Secretary. According to some sources, during this term, he worked as an officer of the First Chief Directorate of the KGB (foreign intelligence).
After 1991 he was a private businessman until 1997 when he once again became a government official.
In April 1991 together with Yuriy Kovalchuk and Sergey Fursenko he founded the enterprise TEMP Ltd. and became its deputy director general, Sergey Fursenko assumed the position of director general.
Also in 1991, together with Yuriy Kovalchuk and Viktor Myachin, he founded JSC Quark (later renamed to JSC Stream).
In December 1991 he became a member of the board of directors and minor shareholder of the Russia bank.
Since the early 90s, Yakunin owns a dacha in Solovyovka, Priozersky district of the Leningrad region, which is located on the eastern shore of the Komsomol'skoye lake on the Karelian Isthmus near St. Petersburg. His neighbours there are Vladimir Putin, Andrei Fursenko, Sergey Fursenko, Yuriy Kovalchuk, Viktor Myachin, Vladimir Smirnov and Nikolay Shamalov. On November 10, 1996, together they instituted the co-operative society Ozero (the Lake) which united their properties.
In January 1997 Yakunin was elected member of the board of directors of BaltUneximbank.
From December 7, 2000 to February 2002, Yakunin was deputy of Russia's Transport Minister Sergey Frank.
On February 8, 2002 he was appointed First deputy of the new Transport Minister Gennady Fadeev where he worked until October 22, 2003.
On October 24, 2003 Yakunin became Deputy Head of the Russian Railways headed by Gennady Fadeev, created out of the Ministry. On June 15, 2005, he became Head of the Russian Railways.
Yakunin is Chairman of the Committee of Trustees of the Center of the National Glory of Russia and St. Andrew's Foundation organizations which fund Orthodox Church-related projects.
Yakunin is also President of the "World Public Forum - Dialogue of Civilizations", an International NGO, registered in Vienna, Austria, which he co-founded with C.Kapur of India and N.Papanikolao from Greece/USA. World Public Forum - Dialogue of Civilizations is an initiative to link people of different civilizations, traditions and religions. It organizes the annual Rhodes Conference on Dialogue of Civilizations.
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