Maksim Litvinov (1876–1951) was a Soviet revolutionary, a diplomat, a statesman, and a People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the USSR. He was a delegate to the Third Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (RSDLP) (1905) and helped organize the first legal Bolshevik newspaper, Novaya Zhizn’ (New Life), in St. Petersburg.
M. Litvinov was a member of the Collegium of the Council of People’s Commissars for State Control and a Deputy Chairman of the Main Concession Committee. From 1927 to 1930, he led the Soviet delegation to the League of Nations Preparatory Commission on Disarmament. From 1930 to 1939, he was People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the USSR.
From 1941 to 1946, Litvinov was a Deputy People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the USSR; concurrently, from 1941 to 1943, he was the Soviet Ambassador to the United States, and from 1942 to 1943, the Soviet Envoy to Cuba. In September of 1943, he headed the Commission on Peace Treaties and Postwar Arrangements, established under the People’s Commissariat for Foreign Affairs of the USSR. He retired in 1946.
The postage stamp provides a portrait of statesman Maksim Litvinov against the background of the former building of the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs of the USSR.
| Paper |
Printing method |
Perforation |
Format of the stamp |
Edition |
| Chalk surfaced |
Offset + security system |
Comb 11¼ |
37 × 37 mm |
42 thousand stamps |