The Russian population shrank by 1.8 million people between the 1989 and 2002 censuses due to natural decreases, caused mainly by an increase in early deaths of males and a decline in birth rates. The life expectancy of males decreased to 57.6 years in 1994, the year of the bottom of demographic deterioration. In particular, mortality rates of 30-44-year-old men almost doubled from 1989 to 2002. If we compare these data with corresponding Japanese ones in 2002, the mortality rates of 25-44-year-old Russian males exceed those of Japanese by more than 8 times. This paper analyses the causes and regional characteristics of this unprecedented deterioration in male longevity, using the official data of mortality by age and region in those 14 years from 1989 through 2002 that have been unavailable until recently. Note that "regions" here refers to the 89 "subjects of federation," including republics, krais, oblasts and so on. In the first place, in the principal analysis of annual mortality data by region we confirmed that regional differences in the mortality of both all men and the male working age population (16-59 years old) remained almost unchanged in these 14 years. Male mortality continued to be high in regions of the central and north-west parts of European Russia, excluding Moscow and St. Petersburg (where an influx of younger men from both inside and outside of the country may have reduced mortality rates), as well as in some regions of east Siberia, while in regions of the north Caucasus mortality remained low. The data for male mortality rates by age in 2002 indicated that the mortality rate of the younger generation (25-34 years old) was high in Siberia, the while mortality rate of the older cohort (35-44 years old) was high in the central and north-west parts of European Russia. In the next step, we carried out principal and cluster analyses on the regional data for male mortality of the working age population and the causes of their deaths. The result of these analyses showed that regions of the central part of European Russia, excluding Moscow, were characterized by a high mortality rate of the working age population and high percentage of deaths caused by diseases of the circulatory system and cancer, while regions of east Siberia and Kalinigrad were characterized by high mortality rate and the prevalence of deaths caused by trauma and poisoning, including suicide and homicide. Note that the diseases of the circulatory system contributed most to the increase in male deaths from 1989 to 1994, followed by trauma and poisoning in Russia. Finally, similar analyses were carried out on the regional data for male mortality by age (25-29, 30-34, 35-39 and 40-44 years old) and causes of death for the male working age population. The results clearly showed that in regions of the central and north-west parts of European Russia (excluding again Moscow and St. Petersburg), where the mortality of 40-44-year-old men was high, deaths caused by diseases of the circulatory system were dominant, while in east Siberian regions and Kaliningrad, where the mortality of 25-34-year-old men was high, deaths caused by trauma and poisoning, including suicide and homicide, prevailed. Statistics of crimes by region also indicated that among crime rates in Russia; those for Siberia were relatively high. The earlier literature pointed out three main causes of the increase in early deaths of Russian males: 1) economic and social crisis caused by system transformation which started in early 1990s; 2) the influence of the anti-alcohol campaign launched by Gorbachev in mid-1980s and its artifact; and 3) the influence of longer trends of male mortality increase which started in the 1960s. This paper suggests that both system transformation and increases in alcohol consumption following the liberalization of alcohol prices and sales in 1992 had a significant influence on the male

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