The Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia

The Russian perestroika that was introduced by Mikhail Gorbachev in the mid-1980s marked the last years of communism in Czechoslovakia. The late 1980s are characterized by public demonstrations. A week after the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989, the Velvet Revolution brought an end to communism. Václav Havel, former dissident, was elected president during the country's first democratic elections in January 1990. On January 1, 1993, Czechoslovakia peacefully split into two independent countries, Czech Republic and Slovakia, and Havel was elected the first president of the Czech Republic. The Czech Republic joined NATO in 1999 and was approved to become a member of the European Union in 2002. On May 1, 2004 the Czech Republic joined the EU along with 10 other nations.