In Lithuania, the Communist Party Congress votes 855-160 to become independent from the Soviet Union.
Lithuania’s parliament votes to legalize parties opposed to the Communists and reduce the Soviet monopoly on power.
U.S. President George Bush and Gorbachev meet in Malta, where they declare a new era in U.S.-Soviet relations.
In the first-ever meeting between a Soviet leader and a pope, Gorbachev and John Paul II hold talks in Rome and agree to establish further diplomatic ties.
The Estonian Supreme Soviet nullifies the annexation of Estonia in 1940.
A commission investigating the events of 1939-1940 declares that Latvia was illegally occupied by the Soviet Union.
Rahva Haal, the daily newspaper of the Estonian Communist Party, appears on newsstands without the Soviet coat of arms.
At its annual conference, the Latvian Popular Front announces its goal of secession from the Soviet Union.
The Baltic popular fronts meet in Lithuania to establish a consultative body.
A parliamentary commission in Lithuania declares the Soviet Union's 1940 annexation of the republic invalid.
The Supreme Council of the Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic accepts a declaration on Latvia's sovereignty and agrees to pass a law allowing greater freedom for public meetings and demonstrations.
The nationalist Birlik movement in Uzbekistan holds its founding conference. Birlik's program calls for a complete break with Moscow, a pan-Turkic alliance, and the furthering of Islamic culture.
Delegates from the Lithuanian, Latvian, and Estonian popular front movements meet in Tallinn. They ask the Soviet Union, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, and the United Nati...
Kyrgyz intellectuals form the republic's first political opposition group, Ashar, which focuses on the acute housing shortage in Bishkek. Communists aid the effort by donating land.
The Nevada-Semipalatinsk opposition movement, named after nuclear test sites in the United States and the USSR, is founded in Kazakhstan. The movement grew out of a demonstration organized by Kazak...