The Peoples' Friendship University of Russia (Russian: Российский университет дружбы народов, РУДН) is an educational and research institution located in the South of Moscow and is ranked by the Ministry of Education of Russia as the country's third-best university after Moscow State University and Saint Petersburg State University. It was founded in 1960 as Peoples' Friendship University (Russian: Университет дружбы народов им. Патриса Лумумбы). Its stated objective at the time was to help nations of the Third World, mainly in Asia, Africa and South America, at the height of the Cold War by providing higher education and professional training, but many students from developed countries also attended. Peoples’ Friendship University was established by the government of the Soviet Union on February 5, 1960. The Soviet government decided to establish Peoples’ Friendship University in response to the requests of former colonial countries. On February 22, 1961, it was renamed in honour of Patrice Lumumba, the leader of what later became the Democratic Republic of the Congo, who had been overthrown and murdered in a coup only days earlier.