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Latvia, officially the Republic of Latvia, is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the Baltic states; and is bordered by Estonia to the north, Lithuania to the south, Russia to the east, Belarus to the southeast, and shares a maritime border with Sweden to the west. Latvia covers an area of 64,589 km2 (24,938 sq mi), with a population of 1.9 million. The country has a temperate seasonal climate. Its capital and largest city is Riga. Latvians belong to the ethno-linguistic group of the Balts; and speak Latvian, one of the only two surviving Baltic languages. Russians are the most prominent minority in the country, at almost a quarter of the population.
The history of Latvia began around 9000 BC with the end of the last glacial period in northern Europe. Ancient Baltic peoples arrived in the area during the second millennium BC, and four distinct tribal realms in Latvia's territory were identifiable towards the end of the first millennium AD. Latvia's principal river Daugava, was at the head of an important trade route from the Baltic region through Russia into southern Europe and the Middle East that was used by the Vikings and later Nordic and German traders.
The Nuremberg trials were held by the Allies against representatives of the defeated Nazi Germany, for plotting and carrying out invasions of other countries, and other crimes, in World War II.
A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610.
The Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), was a country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national republics; in practice, both its government and its economy were highly centralized until its final years. It was a one-party state governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with the city of Moscow serving as its capital within its largest and most populous republic: the Russian SFSR. Other major cities included Leningrad, Kiev, Minsk, Tashkent, Alma-Ata, and Novosibirsk. It was the largest country in the world, covering over 22,402,200 square kilometres (8,649,500 sq mi) and spanning eleven time zones.
The Supreme Soviet of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was, beginning in 1936, the most authoritative legislative body of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), and the only one with the power to approve constitutional amendments. Prior to 1936, the Congress of Soviets was the supreme legislative body. During 1989–1991 a similar, but not identical structure was the supreme legislative body. The Supreme Soviet elected the USSR's collective head of state, the Presidium; and appointed the Council of Ministers, the Supreme Court, and the Procurator General of the USSR.
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country, covering approximately 600,000 square kilometres (230,000 sq mi), and has a population of around 40 million people. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast; by Belarus to the north; by Poland, Slovakia, and Hungary to the west; and by Romania and Moldova to the southwest; with a coastline along the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov to the south and southeast, respectively. Kyiv is Ukraine's capital as well as its largest city. The country's language is Ukrainian, and many people are also fluent in Russian.
The final battles of the European Theatre of World War II, as well as the definitive overall surrender of Nazi Germany to the Allies, took place just before midnight on the evening of 8 May 1945 and took effect the following day on 9 May. After German dictator Adolf Hitler's suicide and handing over of power to German Admiral Karl Dönitz in May of 1945, the Soviet troops conquered Berlin and accepted German surrender led by Dönitz. The last battles and surrender of Nazi Germany’s Armed forces elsewhere in Europe, such as remnants of Army Group North in the Courland pocket of the Baltics and in occupied Czechoslovakia during the Prague offensive was on 10/11 May, some 4 days after the official unconditional surrender of Germany to the allies and the capitulation of it’s Armed forces with the aim of breaking out to surrender to the western allies instead of being captured by the Soviet army.
The Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic, also known as Soviet Latvia, was one of the constituent republics of the Soviet Union from 5 August 1940.
The Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania were invaded and occupied in June 1940 by the Soviet Union, under the leadership of Stalin and auspices of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact that had been signed between Nazi Germany and the USSR immediately before the outbreak of World War II. The three countries were then annexed into the Soviet Union as constituent republics in August 1940, though the United States and most other Western countries never recognised this incorporation, considering it illegal. On 22 June 1941, Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union and within weeks occupied the Baltic territories. In July 1941, the Third Reich incorporated the Baltic territory into its Reichskommissariat Ostland. As a result of the Red Army's Baltic Offensive of 1944, the Soviet Union recaptured most of the Baltic states and trapped the remaining German forces in the Courland pocket until their formal surrender in May 1945.
Desertion is the abandonment of a military duty or post without permission and is done with the intention of not returning. This contrasts with unauthorized absence (UA) or absence without leave, which are temporary forms of absence.
During World War II, the Kingdom of Hungary was a member of the Axis powers. In the 1930s, the Kingdom of Hungary relied on increased trade with Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany to pull itself out of the Great Depression. Hungarian politics and foreign policy had become more stridently nationalistic by 1938, and Hungary adopted an irredentist policy similar to Germany's, attempting to incorporate ethnic Hungarian areas in neighboring countries into Hungary. Hungary benefited territorially from its relationship with the Axis. Settlements were negotiated regarding territorial disputes with the Czechoslovak Republic, the Slovak Republic, and the Kingdom of Romania. On November 20, 1940, Hungary became the fourth member to join the Axis powers when it signed the Tripartite Pact. The following year, Hungarian forces participated in the invasion of Yugoslavia and the invasion of the Soviet Union. Their participation was noted by German observers for its particular cruelty, with occupied peoples subjected to arbitrary violence. Hungarian volunteers were sometimes referred to as engaging in "murder tourism."
Abortion in Russia is legal as an elective procedure up to the 12th week of pregnancy, and in special circumstances at later stages. In 1920, the Russian Soviet Republic under Lenin became the first country in the world in the modern era to allow abortion in all circumstances, but over the course of the 20th century, the legality of abortion changed more than once, with a ban on unconditional abortions being enacted again from 1936 to 1955, which from then on it was legalised again. Due to this, the country gained a termed 'abortion culture'. Russian abortions peaked in the middle of the 1960s, with a total of 5,463,300 abortions being performed in 1965.
The electoral system of the Soviet Union was varying over time, being based upon Chapter XIII of the provisional Fundamental Law of 1922, articles 9 and 10 of the 1924 Constitution and Chapter XI of the 1936 Constitution, with the electoral laws enacted in conformity with those. The Constitution and laws applied to elections in all Soviets, from the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, the Union republics and autonomous republics, through to regions, districts and towns. Voting was claimed to be secret and direct with universal suffrage. However, in practice, until 1989 voters could vote against candidates preselected by the Communist Party only by spoiling their ballots, whereas votes for the party candidates could be cast simply by submitting a blank ballot.
Gambling in Russia is legal in four regional subject areas, and in 2009 was made illegal in all other areas of Russia.
The Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic was an ethnically based administrative subdivision of the former Soviet Union covering the territory of Estonia in 1940–1941 and 1944–1991. The Estonian SSR was nominally established to replace the until then independent Republic of Estonia on 21 July 1940, a month after the 16–17 June 1940 Soviet military invasion and occupation of the country during World War II. After the installation of a Stalinist government which, backed by the occupying Soviet Red Army, declared Estonia a Soviet constituency, the Estonian SSR was subsequently incorporated into the Soviet Union as a "union republic" on 6 August 1940. Estonia was occupied by Nazi Germany in 1941 and administered as a part of Reichskommissariat Ostland until it was reconquered by the USSR in 1944.
Elections to the Supreme Soviet were held in the Soviet Union on 10 February 1946. According to Soviet law, 325,000 out of an eligible adult population of 101,718,000 were disenfranchised for various reasons. This election was the first in which a 1945 decree allowed members of the Red Army stationed outside the Soviet Union to vote for both chambers of the Supreme Soviet in special 100,000-member districts, a practice which would continue for decades with the Red Army presence in the Eastern bloc.
Soviet prisoners of war in Finland during World War II were captured in two Soviet-Finnish conflicts of that period: the Winter War and the Continuation War. The Finns took about 5,700 POWs during the Winter War, and due to the short length of the war they survived relatively well. However, during the Continuation War the Finns took 64,000 POWs, of whom almost 30 percent died.
The dissolution of the Soviet Union (1988–1991) was the process of internal disintegration within the Soviet Union (USSR) which resulted in the end of the country's and the federal government's existence as a sovereign state, thereby resulting in its constituent republics gaining full sovereignty. It brought an end to the General Secretary, Mikhail Gorbachev's effort to reform the Soviet political and economic system in an attempt to stop a period of political stalemate and economic backslide. The Soviet Union had experienced internal stagnation and ethnic separatism. The USSR, although a highly centralized state, was made up of 15 republics that served as homelands for different ethnicities. By late 1991, amidst a catastrophic political crisis, with several republics already departing the Union and the waning of centralized power, the leaders of three of its founding members declared that the Soviet Union no longer existed. Eight more republics joined their declaration shortly thereafter. Gorbachev resigned in December 1991 and what was left of the Soviet parliament voted to end itself. Both the Revolutions of 1989 in the Eastern Bloc and the dissolution of the Soviet Union marked the end of the Cold War.
The occupation of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union during World War II (1939–1945) began with the German-Soviet invasion of Poland in September 1939, and it was formally concluded with the defeat of Germany by the Allies in May 1945. Throughout the entire course of the occupation, the territory of Poland was divided between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union (USSR) both of which intended to eradicate Poland's culture and subjugate its people. In the summer-autumn of 1941, the lands which were annexed by the Soviets were overrun by Germany in the course of the initially successful German attack on the USSR. After a few years of fighting, the Red Army drove the German forces out of the USSR and crossed into Poland from the rest of Central and Eastern Europe.
References
- The Distinctiveness of Soviet Law. Ferdinand Joseph Maria Feldbrugge, ed. Martinus Nijhoff Publishers: Dordrecht (1987): 110.
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