Table 1 Events in the Soviet Bloc* and Migration to Sweden.

1945–49

1944–45: Occupation of Hungary by the Soviet Army

1945–47: Communists established as dominant force in Romania

1947: Proclamation of People's Republic of Bulgaria

1948: Communists take power, Czechoslovakia becomes a Soviet-style communistic state

1948: Romania becomes a Soviet-style communistic state

1949: Proclamation of the People's Republic of Hungary

1946–50 – Suppression of the anti-Soviet guerrilla movements in the Baltic republics of the Soviet Union (emigration to escape the Red Army)

1948–53 – Intensification of terror and anti-Semitic campaigns in all member countries of the Soviet Bloc, especially in the Soviet Union

1950–59

1952: Proclamation of People's Republic of Poland

1955: Signing of the Warsaw Pact (all countries)

1956 – Soviet military invasion of Hungary in response to revolution

1960–69

1968 – Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in response to the reforms of the "Prague Spring"

1967–73 – Anti-Semitic campaign in Poland

1968 – Start of the Polish political crisis (major student and intellectual protests against communist government) and consequent start of political persecutions in Poland

1970–79

The whole decade – economic difficulties, social discontent, strikes, protests, and consequent large-scale economic emigration from Poland

1980–89

1989 – Dissolution of the Soviet Bloc

1981 – The military coup in Poland (communist government against "Solidarity" and the strikers)

1982–1983 – Imposition of martial law in Poland: reinforced persecutions of members of democratic movements (formal banning of "Solidarity") and harder military control

1989 – Fall of the Iron Curtain and disappearance of the migration restrictions in Eastern Europe

1990–99

1991 – Breakdown of the Soviet Union

1991 – Disappearance of the migration restrictions in the former Soviet Union