Here’s a look at the life of Mikhail Gorbachev
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Mikhail Gorbachev at a conference in Moscow in 2001. Gorbachev led the Soviet Union from 1985 until its fall in 1991. He changed the world’s expectations of the Soviet Union by striving to make a more efficient and democratic state that participated in global politics.
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A 4-year-old Gorbachev in Privolnoe, Ukraine, circa 1935.
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Gorbachev attends a celebration of the anniversary of the October Revolution in Moscow in 1984.
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Gorbachev and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in England in 1984.
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French President Francois Mitterrand with Gorbachev in Moscow in 1985.
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President Ronald Reagan talks with Gorbachev during a two-day summit between the United States and the Soviet Union in Geneva in 1985.
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Gorbachev at a news conference in Reykjavik, Iceland, in 1986.
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Gorbachev greets well-wishers during a visit to Prague in 1987.
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Gorbachev meets employees of a meat-packing plant outside Moscow in 1987.
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Gorbachev meets crew members of a nuclear submarine during a visit to Severomorsk, Soviet Union, in 1987.
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Gorbachev and Reagan sign a treaty eliminating U.S. and Soviet intermediate-range and shorter-range nuclear missiles in Washington in 1987.
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Reagan and Gorbachev visit Governors Island in New York in 1988.
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President George H. W. Bush with Gorbachev in Valletta, Malta, during a U.S.-Soviet summit in 1989.
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Gorbachev takes the oath at the Congress of People’s Deputies in Moscow in 1990.
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Boris Yeltsin sits with Gorbachev during a session of the Congress of People’s Deputies in Moscow in 1990.
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Gorbachev votes in Moscow in 1991 in the first Soviet referendum to decide whether the country would remain a united state.
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Gorbachev accepts the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway, in 1991. Gorbachev was awarded the prize in 1990.
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Gorbachev shakes hands with Yeltsin after Yeltsin’s investiture as Russian president in Moscow in 1991.
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Gorbachev makes his first appearance after a failed coup in 1991.
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Gorbachev stresses a point during a session of the Supreme Soviet in Moscow in 1991.
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Bush and Gorbachev confer during a joint press conference concluding a two-day U.S.-Soviet summit in 1991 in Moscow.
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President Reagan and his wife, Nancy, chat with Gorbachev and his wife, Raisa, in the front yard of the Reagan’s ranch in Santa Barbara, California, in 1992.
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Gorbachev announces his candidacy for president in Moscow in 1996. Gorbachev garnered 1% of the vote.
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Gorbachev with his daughter Irina, second right, and granddaughter Krenia, third right, at the coffin of Raisa Gorbachev in Moscow in 1999.
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President Bush, Gorbachev and former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl during a ceremony in Prague in 1999.
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Gorbachev pays his respects to Russian soldiers at a Russian military cemetery in Marl, Germany, in 2003.
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Gorbachev next to a bust of himself created by French artist Serge Mangin after unveiling it to guests in Berlin in 2009.
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Gorbachev on stage in London during the finale of the Gorby 80 Gala, a celebration of Gorbachev’s 80th birthday in 2011.
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Gorbachev laughs with former Polish president Lech Walesa at the opening of a conference to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Green Cross International in 2013.
Here’s a look at the life of Mikhail Gorbachev, former president of the USSR.
Birth date: March 2, 1931
Birth place: Privolnoye, Russia, Soviet Union
Birth name: Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev
Father: Sergei Andreyevich Gorbachev
Mother: Maria (Gopkalo) Gorbacheva
Marriage: Raisa (Titarenko) Gorbacheva (1953-September 20, 1999, her death)
Children: Irina
Education: Moscow State University, Faculty of Law (1955), Stavropol Agricultural Institute, Faculty of Economy (1967)
Nominated for one Grammy Award and won one.
1952 – Joins the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and works in various positions in the party for the next two decades.
1955-1958 – Becomes the first secretary of the Communist Party of the Stavropol Komsomol City Committee.
1963 – Becomes chief of the Agriculture Department in the Stavropol region.
1970-1978 – Named the first secretary for the Communist Party in the Stavropol region.
1970-1990 – Deputy of the Supreme Soviet, the highest legislative body in the Soviet Union.
1971 – Becomes a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
March 11, 1985 – Elected general secretary of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union. In this post, he is effectively the leader of the USSR.
1985-1988 – Participates in a series of summit talks with US President Ronald Reagan.
1987 – Signs the Intermediate Nuclear Forces treaty with the United States to limit nuclear weapons.
1989 – Announces the withdrawal of Soviet forces from Afghanistan.
1989-1990 – Chairman of the Supreme Soviet.
1990 – Becomes president of the USSR.
1990 – Wins the Nobel Peace Prize for helping end the Cold War.
December 21, 1991 – USSR dissolves and the Commonwealth of Independent States is formally established.
December 25, 1991 – Resigns as president of the USSR.
1992-present – Founder and president of The International Foundation for Socio-Economic and Political Studies (The Gorbachev Foundation)
1993-2000 – Founds and serves as president of Green Cross International, an environmental organization.
1996 – Runs for election in Russia, but receives only 1% of the vote.
November 24, 2001 – Is elected head of the Social Democratic Party of Russia.
February 8, 2004 – Wins a Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album for Children, for “Prokofiev: Peter and the Wolf/Beintus: Wolf Tracks.” He shares the award with Sophia Loren and former US President Bill Clinton.
May 2004 – Resigns from the Social Democratic Party of Russia over conflicts with party direction and leadership.
January 2006 – Along with a business partner, Gorbachev buys 49% of shares in the independent Novaya Gazeta newspaper.
August 2007 – Appears in print advertisements for Louis Vuitton leather goods.
October 2007 – Becomes head of a new Russian political movement, Union of Social Democrats.
September 19, 2008 – Receives the 2008 Liberty Medal, awarded each year by the National Constitution Center, which is chaired by former US President George H.W. Bush.
November 2009 – Attends ceremonies in Berlin, marking the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.
March 2, 2011 – On his 80th birthday, Gorbachev is awarded Russia’s highest honor, the Order of St. Andrew, by President Dmitry Medvedev.
March 7, 2013 – In an interview with the BBC, Gorbachev is critical of Russian President Vladimir Putin and says, “For goodness sake, you shouldn’t be afraid of your own people.”
May 26, 2016 – The Ukraine bans Gorbachev after he shows support for Russia’s annexation of Crimea.
January 26, 2017 – Writes a piece for Time magazine titled, “It All Looks as if the World Is Preparing for War,” in which he says the most urgent problem we face is “the militarization of politics and the new arms race.”
December 4, 2018 – In an opinion piece in the Washington Post on US President Donald Trump’s intention to withdraw from the INF treaty, which Gorbachev and Reagan signed in 1987, Gorbachev and former US Secretary of State George Shultz write that abandoning the treaty “threatens our very existence.”
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2013/01/11/world/europe/mikhail-gorbachev—fast-facts/index.html
