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The Soviet Union and the United States sign an agreement to end military aid to the Afghan government and the rebels. However rebel fighting continues.
President Santos and Jonas Savimbi of UNITAS agree to a cease-fire in Angola. The MPLA agree to make Angola a multiparty state. However, when Santos wins the UN-supervised elections, Savimbi refuses to accept the results. Fighting resumes in Angola.
The MPLA Central Committee decides to abandon Marxism-Leninism and the one-party state in Angola.
With the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, China becomes the only remaining major world power with a Communist government.
The collapse of the Soviet bloc brings an end to the Mengistu government. An opposition group, the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front, takes control of the government.
President Barre is overthrown by rebel clans. No one group or person emerges to fill the resulting power vacuum in Somalia. In Mogadishu, Mohammed Ali Mahdi is proclaimed president by one group, and Mohammed Aidid by another. Factional fighting and famine follow.
Boris Yeltsin
is elected as the first president of Russia. This comes after Gorbachev's decision in 1990 to allow non-Communist parties to take part in the political arena.
Yeltsin photo gallery.
A CNN clip on Yeltsin taking office.
The Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START I) is signed by Gorbachev and Bush. It outlines cuts in strategic nuclear weapons.
Gorbachev resigns as General Secretary of the Communist party. Four months later he resigns as president of the Soviet Union and transfers control of the nuclear arsenal to Russian President Boris Yeltsin.
For fear that Gorbachev will sign a treaty granting greater autonomy to the Soviet Union's constituent republics, a group of senior Communist party officials detain Gorbachev at his dacha in the Crimea. They demand he either sign a decree declaring a state of emergency or resign. The
coup
ends three days later when Boris Yeltsin leads popular resistance to the coup. After this incident, de facto power passes to Yeltsin.
Cambodia's warring factions and the United Nations sign an agreement in Paris with the intention of ending the conflict in Cambodia. The agreement provides for the creation of a Supreme National Council (SNC) made up of delegates from the various Cambodian factions. Sihanouk serves as president of the SNC. The United Nations assume the government's administrative functions and works towards democratic elections.
The collapse of the Soviet Union has a terrible impact on Cuba as economic aid and trade between the two nations ends. Cuba's economic output plunges.
Recent human rights-related news from Amnesty International.
Poster pictures from Cuba.
In early December, Yeltsin and the leaders of Ukraine and Belorrussia sign an agreement announcing the formation of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). By the end of the month, the Soviet Union is officially dissolved.
Look at some
posters
from the Soviet Union.
With the new government's agreement, the rebellious region of Eritrea is declared independent of Ethiopia. Fighting continues to take place between Ethiopia and Eritrea. Ethiopia continues to face problems of famine and widespread poverty
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