In 1991, an event occurred. Agreement on the Establishment of the CIS ("Belovezhskaya Agreement")

Around 17:00, two telephone conversations took place between President of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev: with US President George W. Bush and German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher.

In a conversation with George Bush, Mikhail Gorbachev said that in two hours he would make a statement about his resignation from the presidency of the USSR. Gorbachev expressed hope that the countries of Europe and the United States would support the newly created CIS as an interstate entity, as well as jointly support Russia.

Mikhail Gorbachev also informed the US President that he was transferring the right to use nuclear weapons to Russian President Boris Yeltsin. "So you can safely celebrate Christmas, sleep peacefully tonight. As for me, I'm not going to hide in the taiga. I will remain in politics, in public life," Gorbachev concluded.

In response, George W. Bush assured that America would remain interested in Russian affairs. "You will be a welcome guest, we will be glad to receive you after everything settles down," Bush promised Gorbachev.
Hans-Dietrich Genscher thanked Mikhail Gorbachev for his contribution to the unification of Germany: "The hearts and gratitude of the Germans will forever remain with you." Mikhail Gorbachev assured the minister that he would continue to promote the rapprochement of East and West.

At about 19:00, Gorbachev signed a decree "On the resignation by the President of the USSR of the powers of the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces of the USSR and the abolition of the Defense Council under the President of the USSR."

At 19:00, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev made a resignation statement on central television.

“Due to the current situation with the formation of the Commonwealth of Independent States, I am terminating my activities as President of the USSR. I am making this decision for reasons of principle. I firmly stood for the independence, independence of peoples, for the sovereignty of the republics. But at the same time, for the preservation of the union state, the integrity of the country. Events took a different path. The line on the dismemberment of the country and the separation of the state prevailed, with which I cannot agree," the statement said.

Further, Mikhail Gorbachev gave his assessment of the path traveled as first General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, and then President of the USSR since 1985, and thanked all the citizens who supported his policy of renewal and democratic reforms.

At 19:38, the state flag of the USSR was lowered from the flagpole of the Kremlin and the state flag of the Russian Federation was raised.

After the televised speech, Mikhail Gorbachev gave a short interview and returned to his office in the Kremlin to hand over the nuclear ciphers to President of the Russian Federation Boris Yeltsin. The farewell meeting between them did not take place. Gorbachev was met by USSR Minister of Defense Yevgeny Shaposhnikov. Yeltsin, dissatisfied with the content of Gorbachev's last speech, refused to accept nuclear ciphers in the former president's office and offered to carry out this procedure in another Kremlin building, on "neutral territory." But Mikhail Gorbachev did not agree with this proposal and, without any television cameras, transferred two colonels to Shaposhnikov, who accompanied the head of state everywhere and constantly, being responsible for the "nuclear briefcase".

There were no other procedures for seeing off the president of the USSR.

The last farewell dinner was held in the Walnut Drawing Room, surrounded by five people from Mikhail Gorbachev's close circle.

On the same day, US President George W. Bush announced the official recognition by the United States of the independence of Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.
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On December 8, 1991, in Viskuli near Brest (Belarus), President of the RSFSR Boris Yeltsin, President of Ukraine Leonid Kravchuk and Chairman of the Supreme Council of the Republic of Belarus Stanislav Shushkevich signed the Agreement on the Disintegration of the USSR and the Creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).

This document went down in history as the "Belovezhskaya Agreement", its preamble stated that "The Union of the SSR as a subject of international law and geopolitical reality ceases to exist", Article 1 read: "The High Contracting Parties form the Commonwealth of Independent States."

At the same time, these same "High Sides", in fact announcing the split of the country, declared that in their actions they are based on exceptional respect for the historical community of peoples. And they also honor the ties between them, take into account bilateral agreements and greatly respect the desire for a democratic rule of law. As a result, given the intention to develop their relations on the basis of mutual recognition and respect for state sovereignty, the “High Parties” of this Agreement announced the collapse of the USSR and agreed to form the CIS.

Also, this document confirmed the commitment of states to the principles of the UN Charter, the Helsinki Final Act, and other international obligations. The Agreement stated that from the moment of its conclusion, the application of the norms of third states, including the former USSR, was not allowed in the territories of the signatory countries, and the activities of the allied authorities were terminated. The inviolability of the existing borders within the Commonwealth was also emphasized, guarantees of their openness and freedom of movement of citizens were declared.

The parties pledged to "develop equal and mutually beneficial cooperation of their peoples and states in the field of politics, economy, culture, education, healthcare, environmental protection, science, trade, in the humanitarian and other fields, to promote a wide information exchange." The agreement was declared open for accession to it by all the republics of the former USSR and other states that share the goals and principles of this document.

Here, for the sake of fairness, it is worth saying that the signing of this document was only the culmination of a large process that has been taking place on the territory of the USSR since the mid-1980s. Changes in the economic and political life of the country led to a deepening of contradictions between the center and the union republics and to radical changes in the political situation in the country. As a result, in 1990 all the union republics adopted declarations of state sovereignty, and the events that took place in Moscow in August 1991 accelerated the process of the collapse of the USSR.

On December 10, the Agreement on the creation of the CIS was ratified by the Supreme Soviets of Belarus and Ukraine, and on December 12 - by the Supreme Soviet of Russia. And on December 13, Ashgabat (Turkmenistan) hosted a meeting of the presidents of five Central Asian states that were part of the USSR: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. It resulted in a Statement in which the countries agreed to join the CIS organization, subject to ensuring equal participation of the subjects of the former Union and recognizing all CIS states as founders.

And for the joint solution of all these issues, a meeting of the heads of 11 former union republics was specially organized: Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Ukraine (from the former union republics, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Georgia). Its result was the signing of the Alma-Ata Declaration on December 21, 1991, which set out the goals and principles of the CIS.

Of the republics of the former USSR, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia did not enter the CIS, and Georgia joined the Commonwealth only in December 1993. Subsequently, the "Belovezhskaya agreement" received an ambiguous assessment both within the countries participating in this agreement and in the world. And disputes over the assessment of its significance and subsequent events continue to this day.

The events that took place from August to December 1991 in the USSR can safely be called the most important in the entire post-war world history. Russian President Vladimir Putin has rightly described the collapse of the Soviet Union as the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century. And to a certain extent, its course was determined precisely by the putsch attempt by the State Committee for the State of Emergency (GKChP). 25 years have passed, new generations of Russian citizens have grown up, for whom these events are exclusively history, and those who lived in those years must have forgotten a lot. However, the very fact of the destruction of the USSR and the timid attempt to save it still cause lively controversy.

Weakening of the USSR: objective and artificial causes

Centrifugal tendencies in the USSR clearly began to be seen already in the late 80s. Today we can confidently say that they were the consequences of not only internal crisis phenomena. The course for the destruction of the Soviet Union immediately after the end of World War II was taken by the entire Western world and, first of all, by the United States of America. This was fixed in a number of directives, circulars and doctrines. Fabulous funds were allocated annually for these purposes. Since 1985 alone, about $90 billion has been spent on the collapse of the USSR.

In the 1980s, the US authorities and intelligence agencies were able to form in the Soviet Union a fairly powerful agency of influence, which, although it did not seem to occupy key positions in the country, was capable of exerting a serious influence on the course of events at the national level. According to numerous testimonies, the leadership of the KGB of the USSR repeatedly reported on what was happening to the Secretary General Mikhail Gorbachev, as well as about the US plans to destroy the USSR, take control of its territory and reduce the population to 150-160 million people. However, Gorbachev did not take any actions aimed at blocking the activities of supporters of the West and actively opposing Washington.

The Soviet elites were divided into two camps: the conservatives, who offered to return the country to traditional tracks, and the reformers, whose informal leader was Boris Yeltsin who demanded democratic reforms and greater freedom for the republics.

March 17, 1991 An all-Union referendum on the fate of the Soviet Union was held, in which 79.5% of citizens who had the right to vote took part. Nearly 76.5% of them supported the preservation of the USSR , but with a cunning wording - like "renewed federation of equal sovereign republics".

On August 20, 1991, the old Union Treaty was to be canceled and a new one was signed, giving a start to an actually renewed state - the Union of Soviet Sovereign Republics (or the Union of Sovereign States), whose prime minister he planned to become Nursultan Nazarbaev.

The members of the State Committee for the State of Emergency, in fact, spoke out against these reforms and for the preservation of the USSR in its traditional form.

According to information actively disseminated by Western and Russian liberal media, KGB officers allegedly overheard a confidential conversation about the creation of the JIT between Gorbachev, Yeltsin and Nazarbayev and decided to act. According to the Western version, they blocked Gorbachev in Foros, who did not want to introduce a state of emergency (and even planned to physically liquidate him), introduced an emergency situation, brought army and KGB forces to the streets of Moscow, wanted to storm the White House, capture or kill Yeltsin and destroy democracy. Printing houses mass-printed arrest warrants, and factories produced huge quantities of handcuffs.

But this theory has not been objectively confirmed by anything. What actually happened?

GKChP. Chronology of major events

August 17 Some of the leaders of law enforcement agencies and executive authorities held a meeting at one of the secret facilities of the KGB of the USSR in Moscow, during which they discussed the situation in the country.

August 18 some future members and sympathizers of the GKChP flew to the Crimea to Gorbachev, who was ill there, to convince him to introduce a state of emergency. According to the version popular in Western and liberal media, Gorbachev refused. However, the testimonies of the participants in the events clearly indicate that Gorbachev, although he did not want to take responsibility for making a difficult decision, gave the go-ahead to the people who arrived to him to act at their discretion, after which he shook hands with them.

In the afternoon, according to the well-known version, communications were cut off at the presidential dacha. However, there is information that journalists managed to get through there by regular phone. There is also evidence that government special communications were working at the dacha all the time.

On the evening of August 18, documents on the creation of the State Emergency Committee are being prepared. And at 01:00 on August 19, Vice-President of the USSR Yanaev signed them, including himself, Pavlov, Kryuchkov, Yazov, Pugo, Baklanov, Tizyakov and Starodubtsev in the committee, after which the State Emergency Committee decided to introduce a state of emergency in certain areas of the Union.

On the morning of August 19th The media announced Gorbachev's inability to perform duties for health reasons, the transfer of power to Gennady Yanaev and the creation of the State Committee for the State of Emergency throughout the country. In turn, the head of the RSFSR Yeltsin signed a decree "On the illegality of the actions of the State Emergency Committee" and began to mobilize his supporters, including through the radio station "Echo of Moscow".

In the morning, units of the army, the KGB and the Ministry of Internal Affairs are moving to Moscow, which take a number of important objects under protection. And at lunchtime, crowds of Yeltsin's supporters begin to gather in the center of the capital. The head of the RSFSR publicly demands "to repulse the putschists." Opponents of the GKChP begin to build barricades, and a state of emergency is introduced in Moscow.

August 20 large-scale rally near the White House. Yeltsin personally speaks to its participants. Participants of mass actions are beginning to be frightened by rumors about the impending assault.

Later, the Western media will tell heartbreaking stories about how the putschists were going to throw tanks and special forces at the "defenders of democracy", and the commanders of the special forces refused to carry out such orders.

Objectively, there is no data on the preparation of the assault. Special Forces officers subsequently denied both the existence of orders to attack the White House, and their refusal to carry them out.

In the evening, Yeltsin appoints himself and. about. Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces on the territory of the RSFSR, and Konstantin Kobets- Minister of Defence. Kobets orders the troops to return to their places of permanent deployment.

Evening and night from 20 to 21 August in the capital, there is a movement of troops, there are local clashes between protesters and the military, three participants in mass actions are killed.

The command of the internal troops refuses to advance units to the center of Moscow. Armed cadets of educational institutions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs arrive to protect the White House.

Toward morning, the troops begin to leave the city. In the evening, Gorbachev already refuses to accept the delegation of the State Emergency Committee, and Yanaev officially dissolves him. Prosecutor General Stepankov signs a decree on the arrest of members of the committee.

August 22 Gorbachev returns to Moscow, interrogations of members of the State Emergency Committee begin, they are relieved of their posts.

August 23"Defenders of Democracy" demolish the monument Dzerzhinsky(doesn't it remind you of anything?), the activities of the Communist Party are prohibited in Russia.

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On August 24, Gorbachev resigned as General Secretary of the CPSU and proposed that the Central Committee dissolve itself. The process of the collapse of the USSR became irreversible, culminating in the well-known events of December 1991.

Life after the USSR. Assessment of the events of 1991

Judging by the results of the referendums and elections that took place at the end of 1991 in various parts of the USSR, most of the population of the Union then actually supported its collapse.

On the territory once As a united state, wars and ethnic cleansing began to flare up one after another, the economy of most republics collapsed, crime increased catastrophically and the population began to decline rapidly. The "dashing 90s" burst into people's lives like a whirlwind.

The fate of the republics was different. In Russia, the era of the aforementioned "dashing 90s" ended with the coming to power Vladimir Putin, and in Belarus - Alexander Lukashenko. In Ukraine, the drift towards traditional ties began at the start of the 2000s, but it was interrupted by the Orange Revolution. Georgia moved away from the general Soviet history in jerks. Relatively smoothly out of the crisis and rushed to the Eurasian integration of Kazakhstan.

Objectively, nowhere in the post-Soviet territory the population has social guarantees of the level of the USSR. In most of the former Soviet republics, the standard of living did not come close to the Soviet one.

Even in Russia, where people's incomes have risen significantly, social welfare problems call into question the thesis of rising living standards compared to those that existed before 1991.

Not to mention the fact that a huge superpower ceased to exist on the world map, which shared the first place in the world in terms of military, political and economic power only with the United States, which the Russian people have been proud of for many years.

It is indicative how Russians assess the events of 1991 today, 25 years later. The data of the study conducted by the Levada Center, to some extent, sum up the numerous disputes about the State Emergency Committee and the actions of the Yeltsin team.

So, only 16% of the inhabitants of Russia said that they would come out "to defend democracy" - that is, they would support Yeltsin and defend the White House - in the place of the participants in the events of 1991! 44% categorically answered that they would not defend the new government. 41% of respondents are not ready to answer this question.

Today, only 8% of the inhabitants of Russia call the events of August 1991 the victory of the democratic revolution. 30% characterize what happened as a tragic event that had disastrous consequences for the country and people, 35% - just as an episode in the struggle for power, 27% found it difficult to answer.

Speaking about the possible consequences after the victory of the State Emergency Committee, 16% of the respondents said that given the current development of events, Russia would live better today, 19% - that they would live worse, 23% - that they would live the same way they live today. 43% could not decide on an answer.

15% of Russians believe that in August 1991 the representatives of the State Emergency Committee were right, 13% - that Yeltsin's supporters. 39% say that they did not have time to understand the situation, and 33% do not know what to answer.

40% of the respondents said that after the events of August 1991 the country went in the wrong direction, 33% - that in the right direction. 28% found it difficult to answer.

It turns out that about a third to a half of Russians are not sufficiently informed about the events of August 1991 and cannot unequivocally assess them. The rest of the population is moderately dominated by those who assess the "August revolution" and the activities of the "defenders of democracy" negatively. The vast majority of Russian citizens would not take any action to counter the GKChP. In general, few people today rejoice at the defeat of the committee.

So what really happened in those days and how to evaluate these events?

GKChP - an attempt to save the country, an anti-democratic coup or a provocation?

On the eve it became known that the CIA predicted the emergence of the State Emergency Committee in April 1991! An unknown speaker from Moscow informed the secret service leadership that the "hard-liners", the traditionalists, were ready to remove Gorbachev from power and reverse the situation. At the same time, Langley believed that it would be difficult for Soviet conservatives to retain power. A Moscow source listed all the leaders of the future GKChP and predicted that Gorbachev, in the event of a potential rebellion, would try to maintain control over the country.

It is clear that there is not a word about the US response in the information document. But, of course, they should have been. When the GKChP arose, the US leadership severely condemned it and did everything in order to achieve similar actions from other Western countries. The position of the heads of the United States, Great Britain and other Western states was voiced by journalists directly in the Vesti program, which, in turn, could not but affect the minds of the doubting Soviet citizens.

In the whole history of the GKChP, there are a number of oddities.

Firstly, the leaders of the powerful power structures of the USSR, undisputed intellectuals and excellent organizers of the old school, for some reason acted spontaneously, uncertainly and even somehow bewildered. They have not been able to decide on the tactics of action. Yanaev's shaking hands went down in history while speaking to the camera.

From which it is logical to assume that the creation of the State Emergency Committee was a completely unprepared step.

Secondly, Yeltsin's team, which did not consist of such experienced and powerful people as their opponents, worked like clockwork. Warning schemes, transport, communications were effective; the defenders of the barricades were well fed and watered; leaflets were printed and distributed in huge numbers; their own media worked.

Everything indicates that Yeltsin was well prepared for such a development of events.

Thirdly, Mikhail Gorbachev, who continued to be the official head of the USSR, fell ill at the right time and left Moscow. Thus, the country was deprived of supreme power, and he himself remained as if he had nothing to do with it.

Fourth, the president of the USSR did not take any measures to try to stop the leaders of the GKChP. On the contrary, with his words he gave them complete freedom of action.

Fifth, today it is known that back in June 1991, the US authorities discussed the prospect of a putsch in the USSR with Gorbachev and the leadership of the USSR Foreign Ministry. Wouldn't the president of the Union, if he wanted to, have prevented it in two months?

All these strange facts raise questions and doubts about the official interpretation of the victorious side, according to which the GKChP was an illegal military junta that, without the knowledge of Gorbachev, tried to stifle the germs of democracy. Moreover, all of the above suggests the version that Gorbachev and Yeltsin could deliberately provoke their political opponents to take action at an inconvenient time for them.

On the one hand, the signing of the new Union Treaty was a victory for the reformers. But the victory, to put it mildly, half-hearted. The traditionalists, who occupied almost all key positions in the state, if they were well prepared, had all the necessary tools to disrupt the signing of the treaty during the event itself by political means and to politically counterattack during the crisis that would inevitably follow the signing itself. In fact, the traditionalists were forced to act without preparation, at an inconvenient time for themselves against opponents who, on the contrary, were well prepared for the fight.

Everything indicates that Gorbachev and Yeltsin could banally lure the organizers of the State Emergency Committee into a trap, after falling into which they were forced to act according to someone else's scenario. Everyone who could stop the death of the USSR in 1991 was thrown out of the game overnight.

Some of the members of the GKChP and those who sympathized with the committee died soon after the coup under mysterious circumstances, committing strange suicides, while the other part was quietly amnestied in 1994, when it no longer posed any threat. The gekachepists were set up, but when it became clear it was too late to do anything.

The events of August 1991 fit perfectly into the scheme of color revolutions, with the only difference that the head of state actually played on the side of the "revolutionaries - defenders of democracy." Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev could probably tell a lot of interesting things, but he is unlikely to do it. A man whom fate has elevated to the very heights of world politics, the head of a superpower, has exchanged all this for an advertisement for pizza and a bag. And the citizens of Russia, even after 25 years, perfectly understand this and evaluate it accordingly.

Those who propose to forget the history of August 1991 as a nightmare are categorically wrong. Then we experienced one of the most tragic events in our history, and it is simply vital to work on the mistakes in this regard. The bloody consequences of the collapse of the USSR still have to be disentangled - including in Ukraine: in the Donbass they are now being killed largely due to the fact that the State Emergency Committee could not stop the local princes who wanted to break the state for the sake of personal power.

At the same time, the supporters of the other extreme, denying the right of the Russian Federation to exist because of the tragedy of August 1991, are also wrong. Yes, the USSR was destroyed contrary to the will of the people, expressed at the referendum on March 17, but this is not a reason to refuse Russia to have the current statehood - a guarantee of the sovereign existence of the Russian people. On the contrary, everything must be done to develop the Russian Federation as an internationally recognized successor to the USSR. And the most important task is to restore the former greatness of our Fatherland on its basis.

1991 - the Belovezhskaya agreement on the formation of the CIS was signed

1991 - Belovezhskaya agreement was signed on the formation of the Commonwealth of Independent States.
On December 8, 1991, in Viskuli (the residence of the Belarusian government in Belovezhskaya Pushcha), the leaders of Belarus, the Russian Federation and Ukraine signed an agreement on the creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). On December 21, 1991, in Alma-Ata, the heads of eleven sovereign states signed a protocol to this agreement, in which it was noted that Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, the Russian Federation, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Ukraine on an equal footing form Commonwealth of Independent States. Georgia joined the CIS in December 1993. Of the republics of the former USSR, the CIS did not include Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. The Commonwealth of Independent States operates on the basis of the Charter adopted by the Council of Heads of State on January 22, 1993, based on the principles of sovereign equality of all its members. The member states of the Commonwealth are independent and equal subjects of international law. In January 1993, the Charter of the CIS was adopted, in January 1996 - the provisions on the emblem and flag of the CIS. According to the Charter, the CIS member states are sovereign and equal and are independent and equal subjects of international law. The main goal of the Commonwealth is the implementation of cooperation in the political, economic, environmental, humanitarian and cultural fields. There are more than 60 interstate (intergovernmental) coordinating and consultative bodies in the Commonwealth, the main of which are: the Council of Heads of State, the Council of Heads of Government, the Council of Foreign Ministers, the Council of Defense Ministers, the Economic Court, the Interstate Bank, the Interparliamentary Assembly, the Executive Committee. Various associations operate within the framework of the Commonwealth: the Union State of Russia and Belarus, EurAsEC, CAEC, GUUAM.

1980 - John Lennon killed

1980 - John Lennon, a major representative of the pop culture of the twentieth century, one of the legendary "The Beatles", is killed.
John Lennon was born in the English city of Liverpool in 1940. In the summer of 1956, John Lennon met Paul McCartney, and they began to write songs and collect musical groups. In 1957, Lennon and McCartney formed the Quarry Men. In 1960, the group undergoes minor changes and, becoming "The Beatles", begins performing in Germany. The conquest of their native Liverpool began in 1961 - the ensemble played several times a week at the Cavern Club. The following year, The Beatles' first single, Love Me Do, was released, and this was the beginning of The Beatles' triumphal march around the world. Their albums and songs have won the hearts of many millions of listeners - suffice it to name only the most famous - "Let It Be", "Yesterday", "And I Love Her", "Yellow Submarine". The style of "The Beatles" was formed on the basis of the influence of American blues, country, rock and roll. Later, George Harrison brought elements of traditional Indian music into the band's music. After the breakup of The Beatles, Lennon took up solo activities, which took place mainly in collaboration with Yoko Ono, the second and last wife of the musician. In October 1971, John Lennon recorded his best album "Imagine", which instantly took the top line in the charts in England and the USA. On November 15, 1980, Lennon's last lifetime album, Double Fantasy, was released. On December 8, 1980, a tragedy occurred in New York: the musician was shot dead by the maniac Mark Chapman. John Lennon is known not only as a musician, but also as a fighter for peace, his song "Imagine" has become the anthem of the pacifists.

1934 - Alisa Brunovna Freindlikh was born

1934 - Alisa Brunovna Freindlikh, actress, People's Artist of the USSR, was born.
Alisa Freindlich was born on December 8, 1934. Father - Bruno Arturovich Freindlich - one of the leading actors of the Pushkin Academic Drama Theater (Alexandrinsky Theater). In 1957 she graduated from the Leningrad Theater Institute (course of B.V. Zone). She began her stage career at the V.F. Komissarzhevskaya Drama Theater, where her debut in the play “A Time to Love” was immediately noticed by the theater community. Then, for almost two decades, she worked at the Lensoviet Theater under the direction of I.P. Vladimirov, with whom she had a marital relationship. Here, the roles that brought the actress wide popularity in the performances "Tanya", "My poor Marat", "The Taming of the Shrew", "People and Passions" were played.
In 1982, she joined the troupe of the Academic Bolshoi Drama Theatre, where she played in the performances of The Barmaid from the Disco, Cunning and Love, The Cherry Orchard, Macbeth, Arcadia, California Suite and others. A lot of fruitful work in film and television. She starred in the films "An Unfinished Tale", "Talents and Admirers", "The City Lights the Lights", "The Tale of the Newlyweds", "The First Visitor" (1965); "The Adventures of a Dentist"; "Love", "Melody of the Verian Quarter", "Anna and the Commander", "Straw Hat", "Agony", "The Princess and the Pea", "Office Romance", "D" Artagnan and the Three Musketeers, "Old-fashioned Comedy", "Stalker", "Cruel Romance", "The Secret of the Snow Queen", "The Secret of Queen Anne, or Musketeers" and many others. Awarded by the International Dramatic Society "For contribution to the development of dramatic arts that overcomes international barriers", holder of the honorary badge "Public recognition ”, Laureate of the Golden Mask theater award in the nomination “For Honor and Dignity”. In 2001, she was awarded the title of “Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg”. Awarded the Order of Merit for the Fatherland, IV degree (2004). nomination "For contribution to the development of acting art" (2004).

1865 - Jean Sibelius is born

1865 - Jan Sibelius (1865-1957), Finnish composer, head of the national music school, the largest symphonist, was born.
Jan (Johan) Sibelius was born in Hämenlinna (Swedish name Tavastehus) in Finland. He studied with M. Vegelius in Helsinki, improved his musical skills with A. Becker in Berlin, R. Fuchs and K. Goldmark in Vienna. The most significant are major orchestral works (seven symphonies and 14 symphonic poems). Sibelius organically translated in his works the peculiar northern flavor of Finnish folk music, using the features of its harmonic and rhythmic turns. The Kullervo Symphony, symphonic poems, including the Lamminkäinen cycle are based on the poetic images of the Kalevala national epic: four poems, among them the Tuonel Swan, which brought fame to Sibelius), The Daughter of the North, Tapiola ". Many of the composer's works are imbued with the ideas of patriotism (the First and Second Symphonies, the symphonic poem "Finland", choral works, including the heroic cantata "Native Land"). Impressionistic colors are characteristic of his programmatic works, embodying images of nature (symphonic poems "Saga", "Spring", "Night Jump and Sunrise", "Dryads", "Oceanides", "Tapiola", Fourth Symphony). The form of some works of the early and middle periods of creativity deviates from the classical scheme (Second, Fourth and Fifth symphonies), their music is distinguished by a variety of moods, the orchestral palette is rich in original sound formations, the rhythm is characterized by a break, harmonic language - sharpness, astringency. In his later works, Sibelius came to the classical clarity of form and simplicity of expressive means. Popular are his Concerto for Violin and Orchestra, which is distinguished by deep emotions, originality of musical embodiment; lyrical romances "Black Roses", "Reed" and especially "The Girl Returned from a Date"; music for dramatic performances, reworked for concert performance ("Sad Waltz"), orchestral suite from the music for Shakespeare's drama "The Tempest". Since 1950, the Sibelius Week festival has been held every June in Helsinki.

1886 - born Diego Rivera, Mexican painter

Diego Rivera is a famous Mexican painter, muralist and graphic artist, one of the founders of the national school of monumental painting. Born in Guanajuato on December 8, 1886. From 1907 to 1921 he studied and worked in Spain, France, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Great Britain. In 1921 he returned to Mexico and soon became involved in the implementation of the state art program to decorate public buildings with frescoes. During the 1920s, he developed his own style of monumental painting. In the 1930s he became one of the most famous artists in Mexico. From 1930 to 1934, Rivera lived in the United States, working on murals for buildings in New York, Detroit, and San Francisco. In 1931, a large exhibition of his works was held at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. For several years after the 1930s, he was mainly engaged in easel painting. Working in oils and watercolors, he preferred such genres as portrait and landscape. In the early 1940s, Rivera again turned to fresco painting: he worked for the World Exhibition in San Francisco, painted the National Palace in Mexico City. The compositions "Man at the Crossroads" (1933) for the Rockefeller Center in New York and "Sunday at Alameda" (1948) for the Prado Hotel in Mexico City caused political and religious controversy. Rivera died in Mexico City on November 25, 1957.

1998 - four employees of the British company Granger Telecom were executed in Chechnya

In October 1998, three Englishmen and one New Zealander (Stanley Sean, Peter Kennedy, Darren Hickey and Rudolf Pechi), employees of the Granger Telecom company, were abducted in the Chechen Republic. Engineers arrived in the republic to install cell phones and collaborated with Chechentelecom. About 20 armed bandits, after a shootout with guards, broke into the house where the foreigners were staying and took them away in an unknown direction. Only a few days remained before the departure of the engineers from Chechnya. Representatives of all power structures of Ichkeria participated in the search for the hostages. In hot pursuit, even several suspects were arrested, who were later released for lack of evidence. The investigation conducted by the owners of Chechentelecom turned out to be more effective. They quickly established that their foreign partners were in the hands of field commander Arbi Barayev. Businessmen from Chechentelecom took hostage one of Baraev's deputies and offered to exchange him for foreigners. Arbi Baraev refused the exchange, saying that he would only release the hostages for a $10 million ransom. “Do whatever you want with my deputy, I have enough of them. I need money,” they say, the field commander reacted to the conditions put forward to him. The outcome of the failed negotiations was the execution of the hostages. On December 8, 1998, two months after the abduction, the severed heads of foreigners were found on the side of the road near the village of Assinovskaya. These were the first foreign hostages killed in Chechnya. Photos and videos of the severed heads of Stanley Shawn, Peter Kennedy, Darrell Hickey and Rudolf Pechi went around the world and struck everyone with cruelty and cynicism. For the murder of foreigners, Chechen warlord Arbi Baraev received £21 million from Osama bin Ladan; the money became an advance payment for the service of mining nuclear materials by the Chechens, in which the leader of Al-Qaeda was interested. Since then, nothing has been known about the investigation into the murder of foreigners. Arbi Baraev was destroyed in Chechnya back in 2001, his brother and accomplice Movsar - in 2002; On December 21, 2004, in one of the private houses in Grozny, Chechen riot police killed Isa Sakaev, a Barayevite. The representative of the regional operational headquarters for the management of the counter-terrorist operation in the North Caucasus, Ilya Shabalkin, said then that the militant Sakaev was directly involved in the execution of British engineers. The investigation made such a conclusion on the basis of the archive found with the militant and the testimony of the previously detained Barayevites. And in the spring of 2005, a new suspect appeared in the case of the murder of foreign specialists. On April 6 of this year, the Shali District Court of Chechnya authorized the arrest of Adam Dzhabrailov, a resident of the village of Mesker-Yurt, who was suspected of committing several attacks on employees of the local administration and the Chechen police. During the investigation, it turned out that the militant was involved in high-profile crimes committed during Maskhadov's regime, and, in particular, participated in the execution of engineers of a British company.

Twenty-two years ago, on December 8, 1991, in the Viskuli residence in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, the leaders of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine Stanislav Shushkevich, Boris Yeltsin, Leonid Kravchuk and the heads of government of the three Slavic republics of the USSR signed an agreement on the creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States. The so-called Belovezhskaya agreement put an end to the 69-year history of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Moreover, the termination of the existence of the USSR as a subject of international law and geopolitical reality was announced by the leaders of those Soviet republics that established it in 1922.

13 days later, on December 21, in Alma-Ata, the heads of 11 new sovereign states (except the Baltic countries and Georgia) signed a protocol to the Agreement on the establishment of the CIS, in which they emphasized that the Republic of Azerbaijan, the Republic of Armenia, the Republic of Belarus, the Republic of Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic , the Republic of Moldova, the Russian Federation, the Republic of Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, the Republic of Uzbekistan and Ukraine on an equal basis form the Commonwealth of Independent States.

The meeting participants adopted a declaration confirming the commitment of the former Soviet republics to cooperation in various areas of foreign and domestic policy, and proclaiming guarantees for the fulfillment of the international obligations of the former USSR. Georgia joined the CIS in December 1993. But in 2009, a year after the armed conflict with Russia, she left this interstate entity.

The Commonwealth operates on the basis of a charter adopted by the Council of Heads of State on January 22, 1993. It defines the conditions for the membership of states in the CIS, formulates the goals and principles of collective security and military-political cooperation, conflict prevention and dispute resolution, interaction in the economic, social and legal fields, inter-parliamentary ties, and establishes the sovereign equality of all members. It is emphasized that the CIS countries are independent and equal subjects of international law.

The Commonwealth is not a state and does not have supranational powers. The interaction of countries within the CIS is carried out through its coordinating institutions: the Council of Heads of State, the Council of Heads of Government, the Inter-Parliamentary Assembly, the Executive Committee, which is the legal successor of the CIS Executive Secretariat and the Interstate Economic Committee of the Economic Union, etc.

Vyacheslav Budkevich, BelaPAN

The brightest shots of the last months of the existence of the USSR

"Signing of the Agreement on the Liquidation of the USSR and the Creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States". President of Ukraine Leonid Kravchuk (sitting second from left), Chairman of the Supreme Council of the Republic of Belarus Stanislav Shushkevich (third sitting from left) and President of the Russian Federation Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin (second sitting from right) during the signing ceremony of the Agreement on the liquidation of the USSR and the creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States. The government residence of Viskuli in the National Park of Belarus "Belovezhskaya Pushcha". Belarus, Brest region

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