Denis Pushilin

He was born on May 9, 1981 in the city of Makeyevka in a family of workers of the Makeyevsky Metallurgical Plant.

The roots on the father's side — Vladimir Ivanovich - go to Russia. My paternal grandfather came to the industrial Donbass from the village of Nizhny Mamon, Voronezh region. Mom - Valentina Ergashevna Khasanova - comes from near Khmelnitsky, but her paternal roots go to Uzbekistan. Denis's grandfather - Ergash Khasanovich Khasanov - participated in the Great Patriotic War, was awarded many orders and medals for the defense of the Motherland.

He studied well at school, graduated from Makeyevsky City Lyceum in 1998.

From 1999 to 2000, he served in the army on the territory of Crimea in the special forces battalion of the National Guard of Ukraine.

After serving in the army, he entered the Donbass National Academy of Construction and Architecture at the Faculty of Enterprise Economics. Since 2002, he began to combine his studies with work in one of the distribution companies in the city of Makeyevka.

After the coup d'etat in Kiev, he turned to active actions, often speaking at rallies of residents of the Donetsk region, organizing many of them. Since March 2014, he has become one of the leaders of the People's liberation movement in Donbass. He was one of those who, taking responsibility, made the historic decision to proclaim the Donetsk People's Republic on April 7, 2014. He became the co-chairman of the provisional government, actively prepared a referendum on the independence of the Donetsk People's Republic on May 11. All this time, he was with activists around the clock in the Government House, spoke daily to residents, conveying a point of view about the events through the media, including foreign ones, actually becoming one of the main speakers of the DPR.

On May 15, 2014, he was elected Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the DPR (at that time the highest position in the Republic according to the Constitution of the DPR).

On July 18, he resigned and took up the first centralized humanitarian supplies from Russia to Donbass as co-chairman of the "People's Front of Novorossiya".

He was at the origins of the creation of the public movement "Donetsk Republic", headed its executive committee until October 2017.

Following the results of the elections that took place on November 2, 2014, Denis Vladimirovich Pushilin was elected a deputy of the People's Council of the DPR, and on November 14 became Deputy Chairman of the People's Council of the DPR.

From November 9, 2014 to September 11, 2018, he served as the Permanent Plenipotentiary Representative of the DPR at the negotiations of the Contact Group in Minsk.

On September 11, 2015, he was elected Chairman of the People's Council of the Donetsk People's Republic.

Since the end of 2017, he has been leading the Russian Center established in Donetsk to activate and systematize the integration processes of Donbass with the Russian Federation.

After the death of the first Head of the DPR, Alexander Vladimirovich Zakharchenko, Denis Vladimirovich Pushilin was appointed acting Head of the DPR by the decree of the People's Council of September 7, 2018.

On September 25, 2018, during the extraordinary congress of the activists of the ML "DR", he was elected chairman of the public movement "Donetsk Republic".

Denis Pushilin received a landslide victory as a candidate for the post of Head of the DPR according to the results of the popular vote held on November 11, 2018. According to the Central Election Commission of the DPR, 60.85% of voters supported him.

On November 20, 2018, he assumed the post of Head of the Donetsk People's Republic.

Honorary citizen of the city of Makeyevka, honorary citizen of the city of Donetsk.

The owner of a number of orders and medals. In particular, he was awarded the medals "For Assistance" of the Ministry of Justice of the Donetsk People's Republic (December 27, 2016) and "For Contribution to International Cooperation" of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the DPR (February 9, 2016). He was awarded the Badge of Honor No. 1 of the People's Council of the Donetsk People's Republic (May 18, 2017) and the Certificate of Honor of the People's Council of the Donetsk People's Republic (November 24, 2017).

He is married and has three daughters.

He is fond of such sports as football, badminton, weightlifting. Leads a healthy lifestyle.