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Browse Items: Gorbachev
Minutes of the Meeting between Nicolae Ceausescu and Mikhail Gorbachev, December 1989
The seemingly cordial conversation between the Soviet and Romanian communist leaders less than two weeks before the troubles started in Timişoara provides evidence of the wide differences between them. Ceauşescu wields the formulas of orthodox socialism, while Gorbachev tries to point him toward modernization, change, flexibility, and listening to the wishes of the Romanian people. Ceauşescu….
Discussion between Gorbachev and Mitterand about Romania, July 1989
The transcript of the Mitterrand – Gorbachev meeting of July 1989 illustrates the international awareness of the extensive control and repression of citizens in Ceauşescu’s Romania. Unlike his predecessors, Gorbachev was not in control of the Eastern block countries, nor the defender of communist orthodoxy; on the contrary, he had loosened state control over the economy and society, and….