1989 in the Soviet Union

Decades:	1960s; 1970s; 1980s; 1990s; ;
See also:	History of the Soviet Union; List of years in the Soviet Union;

The following lists events that happened during 1989 in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

Incumbents

President of the Soviet Union – Mikhail Gorbachev^[1]
General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union – Mikhail Gorbachev
Chairman of the Supreme Soviet – Mikhail Gorbachev
Vice President of the Soviet Union – Anatoly Lukyanov
Premier of the Soviet Union – Nikolai Ryzhkov

Events

Whole Year: Revolutions of 1989

January to 15 February – Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan.^[2]
6 February — Negotiations between the Polish government and the union ‘Solidarity’ opened.
27 March – 1989 Soviet Union legislative election: first contested elections in Soviet History.^[3]
9 April – April 9 tragedy; a pro-independence demonstration in Tbilisi was put down by Soviet authorities, resulting in the deaths of 21 people.^[4]
18 May – Lithuania declares sovereignty over all of its territory.
25 May – Gorbachev becomes Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union.
23 August — Two million people in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania join hands to form the Baltic Way in the Singing Revolution.
24 September – Lithuania declares 1940 annexation by the Soviet Union to be null and void.^[5]
9 November — Soviet power in Eastern Europe collapses with the Fall of the Berlin Wall.^[6]
28 November — Communist Party of Czechoslovakia announces the end of its monopoly of power, in the Velvet Revolution.
7 December — Lithuanian parliament announces the end of the political monopoly of the Communist Party of Lithuania, in the Singing Revolution.
25 December —Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu and his wife and captured and executed, in the Romanian revolution.

Births

January 14 — Inna Afinogenova, journalist
February 17 —Azat Bayryev, football player

Deaths

January 3 — Sergei Sobolev, mathematician (b. 1908)
January 10 — Valentin Glushko, engineer, program manager of the Soviet space program (b. 1908)
January 24 — Sasha Putrya, Ukrainian artist (b. 1977)
January 27 — Vasily Konovalenko, artist (gemstone sculptures) (b. 1929)
February 2 — Yuri Bogatyryov, actor (b. 1947)
February 7 — Simon Virsaladze, ballet, film and opera designer (b. 1909)
February 20 — Aleksandr Medvedkin, film director (b. 1900)
February 21 — Otar Taktakishvili, Georgian composer and conductor (b. 1924)
March 3 — Vytautas Viciulis, Lithuanian painter (b. 1951)
March 4 — Victor Nikiforov, ice hockey player and Olympic gold medalist (b. 1931)
March 8 — Elisaveta Bykova, chess player and dual Women's World Chess Champion (b. 1913)
March 26 — Maris Liepa, Latvian ballet dancer (b. 1936)
March 29 — Aleksandr Prokopenko, football player (b. 1953)
April 10 — Nikolai Grinko, actor (b. 1920)
April 22 — Dmitry Selivanov, rock singer (b. 1964)
May 2 — Veniamin Kaverin, writer and dramatist (b. 1902)
May 4 — Lydia Pasternak Slater, research chemist and poet (b. 1902)
May 8 — Hendrik Allik, Estonian politician (b. 1901)
May 14 — Nikifor Kalchenko, politician (b. 1906)
May 23 — Georgy Tovstonogov, theatre director (b. 1915)
May 27 — Arseny Tarkovsky, poet and translator (b. 1907)
June 9
- Rashid Behbudov, singer and actor (b. 1915)
- Vladimir Kasatonov, military leader and fleet admiral (b. 1910)
- Piotr Vasiliev, realist painter (b. 1909)
June 10 — Suleyman Rustam, poet, playwright and translator (b. 1906)
June 19
- Betti Alver, Estonian poet (b. 1906)
- Yevgeny Kabanov, Naval Aviation major general (b. 1918)
- Andrey Prokofyev, sprinter and Olympic gold medalist (b. 1959)
June 21 — Aleksandr Safronov, speed skater and Olympian (b. 1952)
June 30 — Rostislav Plyatt, stage and film actor (b. 1908)
July 1 — Victor Nekipelov, poet and writer (b. 1928)
July 2 — Andrei Gromyko, politician and diplomat, 9th Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union (b. 1909)
July 4 — Leyla Mammadbeyova, first Azerbaijani female aviator (b. 1909)
August 25 — Yan Frankel, composer and performer (b. 1920)
September 7 — Valery Goborov, basketball player and Olympic gold medalist (b. 1966)
October 13 — Merab Kostava, Georgian dissident, musician and poet (b. 1939)
October 14 — Klavdiya Mayuchaya, javelin thrower and European champion (b. 1918)
October 15 — Tadevos Hakobyan, Armenian historian and geographer (b. 1917)
October 17 — Mark Krein, mathematician (b. 1907)
October 28 — Yuliya Solntseva, actress and film director (b. 1901)
November 7 — Andrey Borovykh, World War II flying ace and twice Hero of the Soviet Union (b. 1921)
November 14 — Samand Siabandov, writer, soldier and politician (b. 1909)
November 22 — Shamil Serikov, wrestler and Olympic gold medalist (b. 1956)
November 28 — Georgy Ilivitsky, chess master (b. 1921)
November 29 — Natan Eidelman, author and historian (b. 1930)
December 1 — Nikolai Patolichev, politician, Soviet Minister of Foreign Trade (b. 1908)
December 3 — Alexander Obukhov, physicist and applied mathematician (b. 1918)
December 5 — Sofiya Kalistratova, lawyer and human rights activist (b. 1907)
December 7 — Vadim Spiridonov, film actor and director (b. 1944)
December 8 — Mykola Livytskyi, Ukrainian politician, prime minister and president of the Ukrainian People's Republic in-exile
December 14
- Ants Eskola, actor (b. 1908)
- Andrei Sakharov, nuclear physicist, dissident, human rights activist and Nobel laureate in Physics, dilated cardiomyopathy (b. 1921)
December 19 — Kirill Mazurov, politician, 19th First Secretary of the Communist Party of Byelorussia (b. 1914)
December 28 — Pavel Kurochkin, army general (b. 1900)