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Emigration from the Eastern Bloc

After World War II, emigration restrictions were imposed by countries in the Eastern Bloc, which consisted of the Soviet Union and its satellite states in Central and Eastern Europe. Legal emigration was in most cases only possible in order to reunite families or to allow members of minority ethnic groups to return to their homelands.

Date

1945–1992

  • Brain drain in the Eastern Bloc
  • Implementation of border restrictions
  • Construction of the Berlin Wall

Eastern Bloc governments argued that strict limits to emigration were necessary to prevent a brain drain. The United States and Western European governments argued that they represented a violation of human rights. Despite the restrictions, defections to the West occurred.


After East Germany tightened its zonal occupation border with West Germany, the city sector border between East Berlin and West Berlin became a loophole through which defection could occur. This was closed with the erection of the Berlin Wall in August 1961. Thereafter, emigration from the Eastern Bloc was effectively limited to illegal defections, ethnic emigration under bilateral agreements, and a small number of other cases.

Soviet Empire

Soviet occupations

Post-Soviet states

Iron Curtain

Western world

Telephone tapping in the Eastern Bloc

List of Soviet and Eastern Bloc defectors

North Korean defectors

Retracing the Berlin Wall

Berlin Wall: Past and Present

The Lost Border: Photographs of the Iron Curtain

One lucky escape from Communist Romania to the United States

Comprehensive Gallery (1961 to 1990) from the website Chronicle of the Wall

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Virtual e-Tours "The Wall"

The Lost Border: Photographs of the Iron Curtain

(in Italian) 2007 BW photo gallery.

Borders: spotting the past along Berlin death strip.

Information about the Iron Curtain with a detailed map and how to make it by bike

1996 Interview with Viktor Belenko, who escaped in a Mig-25 Foxbat