Eleven republics sign the Alma-Ata Protocol

Tajikistan’s Supreme Soviet adopted a declaration of independence. The republic became sovereign amid economic crisis and political tensions that would soon develop into civil conflict.

Voters overwhelmingly supported independence from the USSR. The referendum expressed popular will during a period of conflict and displacement linked to Nagorno-Karabakh.

A referendum on independence was followed by a declaration establishing Turkmenistan as a sovereign state. The process transferred formal authority to the republic while leaving major economic and...

A majority in every region supported the August Act of Independence. The result gave Ukraine’s independence democratic legitimacy and made a renewed Union increasingly untenable.

The leaders of Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine signed an agreement creating the Commonwealth of Independent States and stating that the USSR had ceased to exist. The decision was taken by republican...

The Council of Republics of the Supreme Soviet adopted a declaration recognizing that the USSR had ceased to exist. The formal end followed decades of union rule, republican mobilization, and a...