Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Defection attempts from the Soviet Union were governed by two laws [clarification needed]: (i) illegal traveling abroad without a passport was a crime punishable by one to three years in prison, even in cases where the destination was another Eastern Bloc country; and (ii) illegal defection to a non-Eastern Bloc state and refusal to return home ...
The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc (Combloc), the Socialist Bloc, and the Soviet Bloc, was an unofficial coalition of communist states of Central and Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America that were aligned with the Soviet Union and existed during the Cold War (1947–1991).
After the creation of the Eastern Bloc from countries occupied by the Soviet Union during World War II, Eastern Bloc countries instituted emigration bans similar to those in the Soviet Union. After the erection of the Berlin Wall in 1961, emigration mostly halted from east-to-west.
As Eastern bloc countries gradually began to open their borders in the 1980s, large numbers of ethnic Germans from these countries began to move to Germany. German law at the time recognized an almost unlimited right of return for people of German descent, [ 30 ] of whom there were several million in the Soviet Union , Poland and Romania . [ 31 ]
Restrictions implemented in the Eastern Bloc stopped most east–west migration, with only 13.3 million migrations westward between 1950 and 1990. [24] However, hundreds of thousands of East Germans annually immigrated to West Germany through a "loophole" in the system that existed between East and West Berlin , where the four occupying World ...
A large proportion of immigrants in western European states have come from former eastern bloc states in the 1990s, especially in Spain, Greece, Germany, Italy, Portugal and the United Kingdom. There are frequently specific migration patterns, with geography, language and culture playing a role.
Polish immigration to Italy might continue while the EU contract labour program between the two countries remains in place. History of Polish migration to Italy dates back over 500 years. [ 39 ] In the 1920s, some 1,000 Poles lived in Italy, mostly clergy, artists, scholars and students, with Polish associations active in Rome and Trieste .
Restrictions implemented in the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War stopped most East-West migration, with only 13.3 million migrations westward between 1950 and 1990. — Eastern Bloc emigration and defection § Emigration restriction and the German zonal border. The source provides the 13.3 million migrations figure in a table.