Word: lithuanian
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...protocols that cleared the way for the annexation of the Baltics by the U.S.S.R. during World War II. In a sharply worded declaration, a coalition of popular-front leaders denounced the Soviet occupation and demanded the right to "restore independent statehood." The day before, a special commission of the Lithuanian parliament had declared that the U.S.S.R.'s annexation of the republic in 1940 was invalid, flatly contradicting Moscow's denial that the protocols had any bearing on absorption of the Baltics...
...paradox is that Gorbachev's campaign for economic reforms and political liberalization has drawn a more enthusiastic response from the three Baltic republics than from almost anywhere else in the country. The emergence of independent splinter groups like the Lithuanian Party of Democrats, the Estonian Christian Union and the Latvian National Independence Movement has already created something approximating a multiparty system in the Baltics. The Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian delegations to the new Congress of the People's Deputies have proved to be the star pupils of the Gorbachev School of Democracy. The Estonians noted how one young Central Asian...
...Baltic states also demand more say in military affairs. The Estonian government has petitioned Moscow to put more Estonians in the republic's interior-ministry forces and border guards. There have been calls to restore the tradition of local military units like the Sixteenth Lithuanian Rifle Division, and more radical proposals to create a zone of peace in the Baltics. Says Latvian Popular Front leader Dainis Ivans: "We should decide ourselves how many military bases we need on our territory and move step by step toward making Latvia a military-free zone...
...population in their homeland. By 1979 their numbers had dwindled to 53.7%. During the same period, the total of ethnic Russians in Latvia climbed from 11% to 32.8%. Thus, Latvian national aims have to be advanced through the art of compromise. At a time when Lithuanian and Estonian parliamentarians were debating whether to turn down Moscow's election-reform laws last November, the Latvians, led by President Anatoli Gorbunov, veered away from open revolt and drafted alternative wordings for the disputed passages...
...more dramatic moments at the Congress of the People's Deputies occurred in early June, when members of the Lithuanian delegation walked out of the Kremlin's Palace of Congresses in protest against Gorbachev's plan to put the question of a new Committee for Constitutional Supervision to a vote. Considering the importance of constitutional issues for the republics, the Lithuanians wanted more time to discuss the makeup of the committee. Gorbachev compromised and referred the matter to a commission. From the point of view of the pragmatic Estonians, it was a case once again of the Lithuanians "mounting...