In 1962, Nazarbayev joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) where he was prominent member of the Komsomol and a full-time worker for the party. From 1984, Nazarbayev was the Prime Minister of the Kazakh SSR. During his tenure, he was appointed as the Chairman of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan (QKP) in 1989. In April 1990, Nazarbayev became the first president of Kazakhstan by the Supreme Soviet. From there, he supported Russian President Boris Yeltsin against the attempted coup in August 1991 by the Soviet extremists. The Soviet Union fell apart after the coup failed, though Nazarbayev went to great lengths to maintain close economic ties towards Russia by introducing Kazakhstan into the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and eventually the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU).