[4] Ivan Lyakhov was born in Kadiivka, Luhansk Oblast on 6 April 1936, to family of workers of Russian ethnicity.

That same year, he was the 1st secretary of the Kirov zonal industrial production committee of the Luhansk Region LKSMU.

[12][13] From October 1979 to 1981, he was a student of the main branch of the Academy of Social Sciences under the Central Committee of the CPSU.

[16] In June 1983, he was demoted to the 2nd secretary of the Ivano-Frankivsk Regional Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine.

In August 1991, he was the deputy head of the Luhansk Oblast Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine.

In 1997, he had been the chairman of the board of the Luhansk Regional Socio-Community Charitable Foundation for Adaptation (social rehabilitation of persons released from prison).