Averkii Borisovich Aristov

Born Oct. 22 (Nov. 4), 1903, in Krasnyi lar, Astrakhan Province. Soviet political and party figure. Member of the CPSU since 1921.

Aristov was born into a fisherman’s family, and until 1919 he worked in the fisheries. From 1919 to 1921 he worked in the komsomol, and from 1922 to 1925 he studied in a workers’ high school. He served in the Red Army in 1925–26. In 1932 he graduated from the Leningrad Polytechnical Institute; from 1932 to 1934 he worked as a foreman and engineer at the Tsentrolit factory in Leningrad. From 1934 to 1939 he was engaged in scientific and pedagogical work in Leningrad and Sverdlovsk. In 1940 he became secretary of the Sverdlovsk Oblast Committee of the CPSU, and in 1943 he became secretary of the Kemerovo Oblast Committee. In 1944 he became first secretary of the Krasnoiarsk Krai Committee of the CPSU, and in 1950 first secretary of the Cheliabinsk Oblast Committee of the CPSU. In 1952 he became secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU. From 1953 to 1954 he was president of the Executive Committee of the Khabarovsk Krai Soviet, and in 1954 he became first secretary of the Khabarovsk Krai Committee of the CPSU. From 1955 to 1960 he was secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU, and from 1956 to 1964 he was a member of the Bureau of the Central Committee of the CPSU for the RSFSR. Aristov was elected a member of the Central Committee at the 19th to 23rd congresses of the CPSU. From October 1952 through March 1953 and from June 1957 through October 1961 he was a member of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU. Since 1961 he has been the ambassador of the Soviet Union in Poland. He was deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of the second to fifth convocations. He has been awarded three Orders of Lenin and three other orders, as well as medals.