Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the former Soviet Union, passed away on the 30th (local time) at the age of 91.
Gorbachev is regarded as a leading figure in ending the Cold War by overthrowing the tyrannical socialist system by promoting the reform and opening-up policy of the Soviet Union and allowing the reunification of East and West Germany following he came to power.
The following is a diary of Gorbachev’s political history and major events in world history at the same time.
▲ 1985.3 = After the death of Konstantin Chernenko, the general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Gorbachev, the youngest member of the Communist Party’s Politburo at the age of 54, took over and took over. Afterwards, the perestroika (reform) and glasnost (openness) policies were promoted to escape from the economic and political stagnation of the Soviet Union.
▲ 1985.11 = Gorbachev, first summit meeting with US President Ronald Reagan in Geneva, Switzerland. At the time, Gorbaccio said he was “very optimistic” regarding détente and disarmament prospects.
▲ 1986.4 = A nuclear reactor exploded at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine, which was part of the Soviet Union, and a cloud of radiation spread to Europe. Soviet officials recognized the explosion only three days following the accident, raising questions from the international community regarding the opening policy.
▲ 1986.12 = The dissident physicist Andrei Sakhanov, who had been deported to the Gorky region, was pardoned following receiving a phone call from Gorbachev and talking to him. Hundreds of dissidents and religious people are freed during Gorbachev’s reign.
▲ 1987.5 = West German young man Matthias Rust drove a light aircraft Cessna alone from Helsinki, Finland, invaded Soviet airspace and landed on Red Square in Moscow. With this as an opportunity, Gorbachev purged high-ranking military personnel who were opposed to reform and opening up.
▲ 1987.10 = Reformist Boris Yeltsin, selected by Gorbachev’s attention, was expelled from the Politburo following a conflict with Gorbachev, claiming a more radical perestroika.
▲ 1987.12 = Gorbachev and Reagan signed the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) in Washington, DC, to dismantle medium- and short-range missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads. It is regarded as the first treaty signed by the two leaders and a symbolic event towards the end of the East-West Cold War.
▲ 1988.10 = Gorbachev consolidated his power as he became President of the Supreme Council of the USSR.
▲ 1989.2 = The Soviet Union withdrew from the war in Afghanistan, which had lasted for regarding nine years since 1979. Since then, the independence movements of republics in the Soviet Union, such as Georgia and Ukraine, which are adjacent to the Baltic Sea, have gained momentum.
▲ 1989.3 = The first free general elections in Soviet history were held and a new parliament, the People’s Congress, was formed. In the process, independence and separatists won the majority of seats in the three Baltic countries, including Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, and many powerful elderly politicians who were founding members of the Communist Party were defeated.
▲ 1989.11 = The governments of Eastern European countries, a satellite of the Soviet Union, were virtually dismantled, but the Soviet Union did not intervene.
▲ 1989.12 = Gorbachev and US President George W. Bush officially declared the end of the Cold War at the US-Soviet summit held in Malta in the Mediterranean Sea.
▲ 1990.2 = The Communist Party of the Soviet Union gave up the ‘one-party dictatorship’ and allowed a multi-party system. During this period, protests in support of reform broke out across the Soviet Union.
▲ 1990.3 = Gorbachev was elected as the first president of the USSR, with a single candidacy in the elections held at the People’s Congress.
▲ 1990.10 = German Unification Declaration, Gorbachev was deeply involved in the six rounds of negotiations between East and West Germany and played a major role.
= The People’s Congress of the USSR approved the plan to abolish the Communist Party’s centrally planned economy system and introduce a market economy.
= Gorbachev won the Nobel Peace Prize
▲ 1990.11 = Soviet People’s Congress grants Gorbachev the power to issue decrees in almost all public domains.
= Gorbachev proposed a draft ‘Pact of Confederation’ that would transfer substantive powers to 15 federal republics within the Soviet system, but the four republics of Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Georgia rejected it.
▲ 1991.1 = Military suppression of independence movement protests in the Baltic countries killed 14 people in Lithuania and 5 people in Latvia.
▲ 1991.3 = A referendum was held on whether or not to continue the Soviet Union as a ‘new federation of sovereign republics with equal rights’ (confederation of sovereign states). Six other republics refused to participate in the voting.
▲ 1991.4 = In response to the Western North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the Warsaw Pact, a military alliance between the Soviet Union and Eastern European countries in 1955, was abolished. In July of the same year, the Warsaw Pact was dissolved.
▲ 1991.6 = Yeltsin was elected as the first direct president of the Russian Republic.
▲ August 19, 1991 = Soviet Vice President Gennady Yanayev, a moderate reformist, launched a coup that hijacked President Gorbachev’s presidency under the pretext of health problems, and declared a state of emergency in some regions. On this day, the Estonian parliament declared independence from the Soviet Union.
▲ August 21, 1991 = The coup d’état was suppressed in three days following a revolt from all over the Soviet Union. However, the political position of the ‘conservatives’ who wanted to maintain the Soviet system became narrower, and the separatist camp gained momentum. On this day, the Latvian parliament declared independence.
▲ August 24, 1991 = Gorbachev resigned as general secretary of the Communist Party and disbanded the Party Central Committee, confiscating the party’s assets to the state. On this day, Ukraine’s parliament declared independence, and within a week, all republics in the USSR, except Kazakhstan and Russia, withdrew from the federation.
▲ September 9, 1991 = The People’s Congress of the USSR abolished the Treaty on Formation of the Federation signed at the time of the founding of the Soviet Union in 1922 to establish the independence of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, and switched to a temporary system until the signing of the ‘New Federation Treaty’.
▲ 1991.11.16 = The Russian Republic secured the right to export gold, diamond mines and crude oil in the USSR.
▲ 1991.12.8 = Russia, Ukraine and Belarus declared the establishment of the ‘Federation of Independent States’. Gorbachev declared it illegal and opposed it, but he recognized the inevitable trend.
▲ December 25, 1991 = Gorbachev resigned as President of the USSR.
▲ 1991.12.26 = The dissolution of the Soviet Union.
/yunhap news
