yz2022/T2P-DownstreamNLP huggingface dataset:
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On July 1, 1988, the fourth and last day of a bruising 19th Party Conference, Gorbachev won the backing of the tired delegates for his last-minute proposal to create a new supreme legislative body called the Congress of People's Deputies. Frustrated by the old guard's resistance, Gorbachev embarked on a set of constitutional changes to try to separate party and state, and thereby isolate his conservative Party opponents. Detailed proposals for the new Congress of People's Deputies were published on October 2, 1988, and to enable the creation of the new legislature the Supreme Soviet, during its November 29–December 1, 1988, session, implemented amendments to the 1977 Soviet Constitution, enacted a law on electoral reform, and set the date of the election for March 26, 1989.

Question: What did Gorbachev hope to create?
Answer: new supreme legislative body
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On October 2, the Popular Front formally launched its political platform at a two-day congress. Väljas attended, gambling that the front could help Estonia become a model of economic and political revival, while moderating separatist and other radical tendencies. On November 16, 1988, the Supreme Soviet of the Estonian SSR adopted a declaration of national sovereignty under which Estonian laws would take precedence over those of the Soviet Union. Estonia's parliament also laid claim to the republic's natural resources including land, inland waters, forests, mineral deposits, and to the means of industrial production, agriculture, construction, state banks, transportation, and municipal services within the territory of Estonia's borders.

Question: What was the name of the group that made its platform known on October 2?
Answer: the Popular Front
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

In the fall of 1985, Gorbachev continued to bring younger and more energetic men into government. On September 27, Nikolai Ryzhkov replaced 79-year-old Nikolai Tikhonov as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, effectively the Soviet prime minister, and on October 14, Nikolai Talyzin replaced Nikolai Baibakov as chairman of the State Planning Committee (GOSPLAN). At the next Central Committee meeting on October 15, Tikhonov retired from the Politburo and Talyzin became a candidate. Finally, on December 23, 1985, Gorbachev appointed Yeltsin First Secretary of the Moscow Communist Party replacing Viktor Grishin.

Question: Who was the new chairman of the State Planning Committee in 1985?
Answer: Nikolai Talyzin
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

In May 1985, Gorbachev delivered a speech in Leningrad advocating reforms and an anti-alcohol campaign to tackle widespread alcoholism. Prices on vodka, wine, and beer were raised in order to make these drinks more expensive and a disincentive to consumers, and the introduction of rationing. Unlike most forms of rationing intended to conserve scarce goods, this was done to restrict sales with the overt goal of curtailing drunkenness. Gorbachev's plan also included billboards promoting sobriety, increased penalties for public drunkenness, and to censor drinking scenes from old movies. Although this program was not a direct copycat of Tsar Nicholas II's outright prohibition during World War I, Gorbachev faced the same adverse economic reaction as did the last Tsar. The disincentivization of alcohol consumption was a serious blow to the state budget according to Alexander Yakovlev, who noted annual collections of alcohol taxes decreased by 100 billion rubles. Alcohol production migrated to the black market, or through moonshining as some made "bathtub vodka" with homegrown potatoes. Poorer, less educated Russians resorted to drinking unhealthy substitutes such as nail polish, rubbing alcohol or men's cologne, which only served to be an additional burden on Russia's healthcare sector due to the subsequent poisoning cases. The purpose of these reforms, however, was to prop up the existing centrally planned economy, unlike later reforms, which tended toward market socialism.

Question: Whose anti-alcohol program did Gorbachev's remind people of?
Answer: Tsar Nicholas II
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

In the fall of 1985, Gorbachev continued to bring younger and more energetic men into government. On September 27, Nikolai Ryzhkov replaced 79-year-old Nikolai Tikhonov as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, effectively the Soviet prime minister, and on October 14, Nikolai Talyzin replaced Nikolai Baibakov as chairman of the State Planning Committee (GOSPLAN). At the next Central Committee meeting on October 15, Tikhonov retired from the Politburo and Talyzin became a candidate. Finally, on December 23, 1985, Gorbachev appointed Yeltsin First Secretary of the Moscow Communist Party replacing Viktor Grishin.

Question: Who became Chairman of the Council of Ministers in 1985?
Answer: Nikolai Ryzhkov
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

The "Jeltoqsan" (Kazakh for "December") of 1986 were riots in Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan, sparked by Gorbachev's dismissal of Dinmukhamed Konayev, the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan and an ethnic Kazakh, who was replaced with Gennady Kolbin, an outsider from the Russian SFSR. Demonstrations started in the morning of December 17, 1986, with 200 to 300 students in front of the Central Committee building on Brezhnev Square protesting Konayev's dismissal and replacement by a Russian. Protesters swelled to 1,000 to 5,000 as other students joined the crowd. The CPK Central Committee ordered troops from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, druzhiniki (volunteers), cadets, policemen, and the KGB to cordon the square and videotape the participants. The situation escalated around 5 p.m., as troops were ordered to disperse the protesters. Clashes between the security forces and the demonstrators continued throughout the night in Almaty.

Question: When were the first demonstrations in Kazakhstan to protest the removal and replacement of Konayev?
Answer: December 17, 1986

Question: What position did Konayev hold in Kazakhstan prior to his removal?
Answer: First Secretary of the Communist Party
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On October 17, 1987, about 3,000 Armenians demonstrated in Yerevan complaining about the condition of Lake Sevan, the Nairit chemicals plant, and the Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant, and air pollution in Yerevan. Police tried to prevent the protest but took no action to stop it once the march was underway. The demonstration was led by Armenian writers such as Silva Kaputikian, Zori Balayan, and Maro Margarian and leaders from the National Survival organization. The march originated at the Opera Plaza after speakers, mainly intellectuals, addressed the crowd.

Question: What was the demonstrators' nationality?
Answer: Armenians

Question: The protesters were unhappy with the pollution in what body of water?
Answer: Lake Sevan
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On July 1, 1988, the fourth and last day of a bruising 19th Party Conference, Gorbachev won the backing of the tired delegates for his last-minute proposal to create a new supreme legislative body called the Congress of People's Deputies. Frustrated by the old guard's resistance, Gorbachev embarked on a set of constitutional changes to try to separate party and state, and thereby isolate his conservative Party opponents. Detailed proposals for the new Congress of People's Deputies were published on October 2, 1988, and to enable the creation of the new legislature the Supreme Soviet, during its November 29–December 1, 1988, session, implemented amendments to the 1977 Soviet Constitution, enacted a law on electoral reform, and set the date of the election for March 26, 1989.

Question: What was Gorbachev trying to separate?
Answer: party and state
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On October 17, 1987, about 3,000 Armenians demonstrated in Yerevan complaining about the condition of Lake Sevan, the Nairit chemicals plant, and the Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant, and air pollution in Yerevan. Police tried to prevent the protest but took no action to stop it once the march was underway. The demonstration was led by Armenian writers such as Silva Kaputikian, Zori Balayan, and Maro Margarian and leaders from the National Survival organization. The march originated at the Opera Plaza after speakers, mainly intellectuals, addressed the crowd.

Question: Where did the protest march start?
Answer: Opera Plaza
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On June 14, 1987, about 5,000 people gathered again at Freedom Monument in Riga, and laid flowers to commemorate the anniversary of Stalin's mass deportation of Latvians in 1941. This was the first large demonstration in the Baltic republics to commemorate the anniversary of an event contrary to official Soviet history. The authorities did not crack down on demonstrators, which encouraged more and larger demonstrations throughout the Baltic States. The next major anniversary after the August 23 Molotov Pact demonstration was on November 18, the date of Latvia’s independence in 1918. On November 18, 1987, hundreds of police and civilian militiamen cordoned off the central square to prevent any demonstration at Freedom Monument, but thousands lined the streets of Riga in silent protest regardless.

Question: Where did the demonstrators meet in June of 1987?
Answer: Freedom Monument
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On October 17, 1987, about 3,000 Armenians demonstrated in Yerevan complaining about the condition of Lake Sevan, the Nairit chemicals plant, and the Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant, and air pollution in Yerevan. Police tried to prevent the protest but took no action to stop it once the march was underway. The demonstration was led by Armenian writers such as Silva Kaputikian, Zori Balayan, and Maro Margarian and leaders from the National Survival organization. The march originated at the Opera Plaza after speakers, mainly intellectuals, addressed the crowd.

Question: When was the Yerevan demonstration?
Answer: October 17, 1987
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On the next day, December 18, protests turned into civil unrest as clashes between troops, volunteers, militia units, and Kazakh students turned into a wide-scale confrontation. The clashes could only be controlled on the third day. The Almaty events were followed by smaller protests and demonstrations in Shymkent, Pavlodar, Karaganda, and Taldykorgan. Reports from Kazakh SSR authorities estimated that the riots drew 3,000 people. Other estimates are of at least 30,000 to 40,000 protestors with 5,000 arrested and jailed, and an unknown number of casualties. Jeltoqsan leaders say over 60,000 Kazakhs participated in the protests. According to the Kazakh SSR government, there were two deaths during the riots, including a volunteer police worker and a student. Both of them had died due to blows to the head. About 100 others were detained and several others were sentenced to terms in labor camps. Sources cited by the Library of Congress claimed that at least 200 people died or were summarily executed soon thereafter; some accounts estimate casualties at more than 1,000. The writer Mukhtar Shakhanov claimed that a KGB officer testified that 168 protesters were killed, but that figure remains unconfirmed.

Question: How many people were estimated by authorities to have attended the riots?
Answer: 3,000

Question: What were the attendance estimates from non governmental groups?
Answer: 30,000 to 40,000
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On October 17, 1987, about 3,000 Armenians demonstrated in Yerevan complaining about the condition of Lake Sevan, the Nairit chemicals plant, and the Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant, and air pollution in Yerevan. Police tried to prevent the protest but took no action to stop it once the march was underway. The demonstration was led by Armenian writers such as Silva Kaputikian, Zori Balayan, and Maro Margarian and leaders from the National Survival organization. The march originated at the Opera Plaza after speakers, mainly intellectuals, addressed the crowd.

Question: How many people demonstrated?
Answer: about 3,000
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On the next day, December 18, protests turned into civil unrest as clashes between troops, volunteers, militia units, and Kazakh students turned into a wide-scale confrontation. The clashes could only be controlled on the third day. The Almaty events were followed by smaller protests and demonstrations in Shymkent, Pavlodar, Karaganda, and Taldykorgan. Reports from Kazakh SSR authorities estimated that the riots drew 3,000 people. Other estimates are of at least 30,000 to 40,000 protestors with 5,000 arrested and jailed, and an unknown number of casualties. Jeltoqsan leaders say over 60,000 Kazakhs participated in the protests. According to the Kazakh SSR government, there were two deaths during the riots, including a volunteer police worker and a student. Both of them had died due to blows to the head. About 100 others were detained and several others were sentenced to terms in labor camps. Sources cited by the Library of Congress claimed that at least 200 people died or were summarily executed soon thereafter; some accounts estimate casualties at more than 1,000. The writer Mukhtar Shakhanov claimed that a KGB officer testified that 168 protesters were killed, but that figure remains unconfirmed.

Question: Who was demonstrating?
Answer: Kazakh students

Question: How did the Kazakh SSR government say the two protesters were killed?
Answer: blows to the head

Question: Who wrote about the KGB officer's testimony?
Answer: Mukhtar Shakhanov
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

In May 1985, Gorbachev delivered a speech in Leningrad advocating reforms and an anti-alcohol campaign to tackle widespread alcoholism. Prices on vodka, wine, and beer were raised in order to make these drinks more expensive and a disincentive to consumers, and the introduction of rationing. Unlike most forms of rationing intended to conserve scarce goods, this was done to restrict sales with the overt goal of curtailing drunkenness. Gorbachev's plan also included billboards promoting sobriety, increased penalties for public drunkenness, and to censor drinking scenes from old movies. Although this program was not a direct copycat of Tsar Nicholas II's outright prohibition during World War I, Gorbachev faced the same adverse economic reaction as did the last Tsar. The disincentivization of alcohol consumption was a serious blow to the state budget according to Alexander Yakovlev, who noted annual collections of alcohol taxes decreased by 100 billion rubles. Alcohol production migrated to the black market, or through moonshining as some made "bathtub vodka" with homegrown potatoes. Poorer, less educated Russians resorted to drinking unhealthy substitutes such as nail polish, rubbing alcohol or men's cologne, which only served to be an additional burden on Russia's healthcare sector due to the subsequent poisoning cases. The purpose of these reforms, however, was to prop up the existing centrally planned economy, unlike later reforms, which tended toward market socialism.

Question: When did Tsar Nicholas II ban alcohol?
Answer: during World War I,
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On July 1, 1988, the fourth and last day of a bruising 19th Party Conference, Gorbachev won the backing of the tired delegates for his last-minute proposal to create a new supreme legislative body called the Congress of People's Deputies. Frustrated by the old guard's resistance, Gorbachev embarked on a set of constitutional changes to try to separate party and state, and thereby isolate his conservative Party opponents. Detailed proposals for the new Congress of People's Deputies were published on October 2, 1988, and to enable the creation of the new legislature the Supreme Soviet, during its November 29–December 1, 1988, session, implemented amendments to the 1977 Soviet Constitution, enacted a law on electoral reform, and set the date of the election for March 26, 1989.

Question: What was the proposed legislative body called?
Answer: Congress of People's Deputies

Question: What was the ideology of Gorbachev's opponents?
Answer: conservative
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

In spring 1987, a protest movement arose against new phosphate mines in Estonia. Signatures were collected in Tartu, and students assembled in the university's main hall to express lack of confidence in the government. At a demonstration on May 1, 1987, young people showed up with banners and slogans despite an official ban. On August 15, 1987, former political prisoners formed the MRP-AEG group (Estonians for the Public Disclosure of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact), which was headed by Tiit Madisson. In September 1987, the Edasi newspaper published a proposal by Edgar Savisaar, Siim Kallas, Tiit Made, and Mikk Titma calling for Estonia's transition to autonomy. Initially geared toward economic independence, then toward a certain amount of political autonomy, the project, Isemajandav Eesti ("A Self-Managing Estonia") became known according to its Estonian acronym, IME, which means "miracle". On October 21, a demonstration dedicated to those who gave their lives in the 1918–1920 Estonian War of Independence took place in Võru, which culminated in a conflict with the militia. For the first time in years, the blue, black, and white national tricolor was publicly displayed.

Question: What was being protested in Estonia?
Answer: new phosphate mines

Question: What was requested for Estonia in the proposal printed by the Edasi newspaper in 1987?
Answer: autonomy
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On June 14, 1987, about 5,000 people gathered again at Freedom Monument in Riga, and laid flowers to commemorate the anniversary of Stalin's mass deportation of Latvians in 1941. This was the first large demonstration in the Baltic republics to commemorate the anniversary of an event contrary to official Soviet history. The authorities did not crack down on demonstrators, which encouraged more and larger demonstrations throughout the Baltic States. The next major anniversary after the August 23 Molotov Pact demonstration was on November 18, the date of Latvia’s independence in 1918. On November 18, 1987, hundreds of police and civilian militiamen cordoned off the central square to prevent any demonstration at Freedom Monument, but thousands lined the streets of Riga in silent protest regardless.

Question: Where is Freedom Monument?
Answer: Riga

Question: What did the protesters do?
Answer: laid flowers

Question: Where did further protests take place?
Answer: Baltic States
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

In spring 1987, a protest movement arose against new phosphate mines in Estonia. Signatures were collected in Tartu, and students assembled in the university's main hall to express lack of confidence in the government. At a demonstration on May 1, 1987, young people showed up with banners and slogans despite an official ban. On August 15, 1987, former political prisoners formed the MRP-AEG group (Estonians for the Public Disclosure of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact), which was headed by Tiit Madisson. In September 1987, the Edasi newspaper published a proposal by Edgar Savisaar, Siim Kallas, Tiit Made, and Mikk Titma calling for Estonia's transition to autonomy. Initially geared toward economic independence, then toward a certain amount of political autonomy, the project, Isemajandav Eesti ("A Self-Managing Estonia") became known according to its Estonian acronym, IME, which means "miracle". On October 21, a demonstration dedicated to those who gave their lives in the 1918–1920 Estonian War of Independence took place in Võru, which culminated in a conflict with the militia. For the first time in years, the blue, black, and white national tricolor was publicly displayed.

Question: When did the phosphate mine protests begin?
Answer: spring 1987

Question: What group was started by ex-political prisoners?
Answer: MRP-AEG group

Question: Who was in charge of the MRP-AEG group?
Answer: Tiit Madisson
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

On June 14, 1987, about 5,000 people gathered again at Freedom Monument in Riga, and laid flowers to commemorate the anniversary of Stalin's mass deportation of Latvians in 1941. This was the first large demonstration in the Baltic republics to commemorate the anniversary of an event contrary to official Soviet history. The authorities did not crack down on demonstrators, which encouraged more and larger demonstrations throughout the Baltic States. The next major anniversary after the August 23 Molotov Pact demonstration was on November 18, the date of Latvia’s independence in 1918. On November 18, 1987, hundreds of police and civilian militiamen cordoned off the central square to prevent any demonstration at Freedom Monument, but thousands lined the streets of Riga in silent protest regardless.

Question: Who were the protesters remembering?
Answer: Latvians
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

In February 20, 1988, after a week of growing demonstrations in Stepanakert, capital of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (the Armenian majority area within Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic), the Regional Soviet voted to secede and join with the Soviet Socialist Republic of Armenia. This local vote in a small, remote part of the Soviet Union made headlines around the world; it was an unprecedented defiance of republic and national authorities. On February 22, 1988, in what became known as the "Askeran clash", two Azerbaijanis were killed by Karabakh police. These deaths, announced on state radio, led to the Sumgait Pogrom. Between February 26 and March 1, the city of Sumgait (Azerbaijan) saw violent anti-Armenian rioting during which 32 people were killed. The authorities totally lost control and occupied the city with paratroopers and tanks; nearly all of the 14,000 Armenian residents of Sumgait fled.

Question: How many were killed in the ensuing riots?
Answer: 32

Question: Who killed the two Azerbaijanis?
Answer: Karabakh police.

Question: What was triggered by the radio broadcast of the deaths?
Answer: Sumgait Pogrom

Question: How many Azerbaijanis died in the Askeran clash?
Answer: two

Question: When was the Askeran clash?
Answer: February 22, 1988
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

The Partyja BPF (Belarusian Popular Front) was established in 1988 as a political party and cultural movement for democracy and independence, à la the Baltic republics’ popular fronts. The discovery of mass graves in Kurapaty outside Minsk by historian Zianon Pazniak, the Belarusian Popular Front’s first leader, gave additional momentum to the pro-democracy and pro-independence movement in Belarus. It claimed that the NKVD performed secret killings in Kurapaty. Initially the Front had significant visibility because its numerous public actions almost always ended in clashes with the police and the KGB.

Question: Who found mass graves?
Answer: Zianon Pazniak

Question: What is Pazniak's occupation?
Answer: historian
Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union

The rebellion of fellow Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh had an immediate effect in Armenia itself. Daily demonstrations, which began in the Armenian capital Yerevan on February 18, initially attracted few people, but each day the Nagorno-Karabakh issue became increasingly prominent and numbers swelled. On February 20, a 30,000-strong crowd demonstrated in Theater Square, by February 22, there were 100,000, the next day 300,000, and a transport strike was declared, by February 25, there were close to 1 million demonstrators – about a quarter of Armenia's population. This was the first of the large, peaceful public demonstrations that would become a feature of communism's overthrow in Prague, Berlin, and, ultimately, Moscow. Leading Armenian intellectuals and nationalists, including future first President of independent Armenia Levon Ter-Petrossian, formed the eleven-member Karabakh Committee to lead and organize the new movement.

Question: Where were the first demonstrations in Armenia?
Answer: Yerevan

Question: What sort of strike was called?
Answer: transport

Question: How many people protested on February 23?
Answer: 300,000,