1.
Soviet Union
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The Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a union of national republics, but its government. The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 and this established the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and started the Russian Civil War between the revolutionary Reds and the counter-revolutionary Whites. In 1922, the communists were victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian, following Lenins death in 1924, a collective leadership and a brief power struggle, Joseph Stalin came to power in the mid-1920s. Stalin suppressed all opposition to his rule, committed the state ideology to Marxism–Leninism. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and collectivization which laid the foundation for its victory in World War II and postwar dominance of Eastern Europe. Shortly before World War II, Stalin signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact agreeing to non-aggression with Nazi Germany, in June 1941, the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the effort of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin in 1945, the territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged by 1947 as the Soviet bloc confronted the Western states that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949. Following Stalins death in 1953, a period of political and economic liberalization, known as de-Stalinization and Khrushchevs Thaw, the country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took a lead in the Space Race with Sputnik 1, the first ever satellite, and Vostok 1. In the 1970s, there was a brief détente of relations with the United States, the war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters. In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of glasnost. The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing the economic stagnation, the Cold War ended during his tenure, and in 1989 Soviet satellite countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective communist regimes. This led to the rise of strong nationalist and separatist movements inside the USSR as well, in August 1991, a coup détat was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a role in facing down the coup. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned and the twelve constituent republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states
2.
Belarus
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Its capital and most populous city is Minsk. Over 40% of its 207,600 square kilometres is forested and its strongest economic sectors are service industries and manufacturing. In the aftermath of the 1917 Russian Revolution, Belarus declared independence as the Belarusian Peoples Republic, the Socialist Soviet Republic of Byelorussia became a founding constituent republic of the Soviet Union in 1922 and was renamed as the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic. Belarus lost almost half of its territory to Poland after the Polish–Soviet War of 1919–1921, during WWII, military operations devastated Belarus, which lost about a third of its population and more than half of its economic resources. The republic was redeveloped in the post-war years, in 1945 the Byelorussian SSR became a founding member of the United Nations, along with the Soviet Union and the Ukrainian SSR. The parliament of the declared the sovereignty of Belarus on 27 July 1990. Alexander Lukashenko has served as the president since 1994. Belarus has been labeled Europes last dictatorship by some Western journalists, Lukashenko continued a number of Soviet-era policies, such as state ownership of large sections of the economy. Though not directly espousing communism like the five remaining communist countries of China, Cuba, Laos, Vietnam and North Korea, in 2000 Belarus and Russia signed a treaty for greater cooperation, with some hints of forming a Union State. Over 70% of Belaruss population of 9.49 million resides in urban areas, more than 80% of the population is ethnic Belarusian, with sizable minorities of Russians, Poles and Ukrainians. Since a referendum in 1995, the country has had two official languages, Belarusian and Russian, the Constitution of Belarus does not declare any official religion, although the primary religion in the country is Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Belarus is the only European country to retain capital punishment in both law and practice, the name Belarus is closely related with the term Belaya Rus, i. e. White Rus. There are several claims to the origin of the name White Rus, an alternate explanation for the name comments on the white clothing worn by the local Slavic population. A third theory suggests that the old Rus lands that were not conquered by the Tatars had been referred to as white, other sources claim that, before 1267, the land not conquered by the Mongols was considered White Rus. The name Rus is often conflated with its Latin forms Russia and Ruthenia, in some languages, including German and Dutch, the country is generally called White Russia to this day. The Latin term Alba Russia was used again by Pope Pius VI in 1783 to recognize the Society of Jesus there, exclaiming Approbo Societatem Jesu in Alba Russia degentem, approbo, approbo. The first known use of White Russia to refer to Belarus was in the century by Englishman Sir Jerome Horsey. During the 17th century, the Russian tsars used White Rus to describe the lands added from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania
3.
Tachograph
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A tachograph is a device fitted to a vehicle that automatically records its speed and distance, together with the drivers activity selected from a choice of modes. The drive mode is activated automatically when the vehicle is in motion, the rest and availability modes can be manually selected by the driver whilst stationary. A tachograph system comprises a sender unit mounted to the gearbox, the tachograph head. Tachograph heads are of either analogue or digital types, all relevant vehicles manufactured in the EU since 1 May 2006 must be fitted with digital tachograph heads. Digital driver cards store data in a format that can also be read out as a. ddd file. These files - both those read from memory with a download device, and those read from the driver cards - can be imported into tachograph analysis/archival software. They are also used in the world, for example through the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine. The tachograph was originally introduced for the railroads so that companies could better document irregularities, the inventor was Max Maria von Weber, a civil servant, engineer and author. The Daniel Tachometer is known in railways since 1844, the Hasler Event recorder was introduced in the 1920s. For reasons of safety, many jurisdictions have limits on the working hours of drivers of certain vehicles, such as buses. A tachograph can be used to monitor this and ensure that appropriate breaks are taken, the Verkehrs-Sicherungs-Gesetz of 19 December 1952, made tachographs mandatory in Germany for all commercial vehicles weighing over 7.5 tonnes. Since 23 March and 23 December 1953, all new vehicles and buses must be equipped with the device per law Straßenverkehrs-Zulassungs-Ordnung § 57a. Tachographs are mandatory for vehicles allowed to carry a weight of over 3.5 tonnes and vehicles built to carry at least 9 passengers. They are used to review the driving and rest time of drivers during reviews by traffic standards organizations or accident investigation, a driver must carry the tachograph records with him for all days of the current week and the last day of the previous week that he drove. Companies must keep the records for 1 year, in Germany, §16 of the work time regulations lengthens this time to 2 years if the records will be used as proof of work time. EEC regulation 3821/85 from 20 December 1985 made tachographs mandatory throughout the EEC as of 29 September 1986, a European arrangement in regard to the work of driving personnel engaged in international traffic became effective on 31 July 1985. Regulation 561/2006/EC of the European Union adopted on 11 April 2007 specified the driving and these time periods can be checked by the employers, police and other authorities with the help of the tachograph. Most tachographs produced prior to 1 May 2006 were of the analogue type, later analogue tachograph head models are of a modular design, enabling the head to fit into a standard DIN slot in the vehicle dashboard
4.
Aquatic Warbler Memorandum of Understanding
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This MoU provides the basis for governments, NGO’s and scientists to work together to save the aquatic warbler, Europe’s rarest songbird. The MoU covers 22 range states, as of August 2012,16 range states have signed the MoU as well as two cooperating organizations. A meeting of the states of the aquatic warbler was held in Minsk, Belarus, from 29 to 30 April 2003, to negotiate and adopt a MoU. Representatives from 12 range states were present and the MoU was adopted and entered into effect on 30 April 2003 and it reflects the common concern over this dramatic decline and calls for cooperation among national authorities to promote the conservation of the species. The MoU protects the population of aquatic warblers in all range states, the aquatic warbler is the rarest and the only internationally threatened passerine bird found in mainland Europe. Apart from a small remnant population in Western Siberia, its breeding grounds are completely confined to Europe. As of May 2010, its population of only 10, 200-13,800 males is confined to less than 40 sites in only six countries. The main threat the aquatic warbler is facing is the loss of habitat due to the decline of traditional, extensive agriculture and overgrowing of the habitat with reeds. All signatories decide to work together to improve the conservation status of the aquatic warbler throughout its breeding, migrating and wintering range. Meetings of signatories are organized regularly to review the status of the aquatic warbler. National reports from the signatories and a report prepared by the secretariat are also submitted. The First Meeting of Signatories took place in Nationalpark Unteres Odertal, Criewen, Germany, during this meeting the geographical scope of the MoU was expanded to include Mauritania and Morocco, since these countries seem to be important stop-over sites for the aquatic warbler. Furthermore, the signatories endorsed working further with competent authorities of three countries originally identified as range states – France, the Netherlands and the Russian Federation. The signatories represented at the meeting were Belarus, Belgium, Bulgaria, Germany, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Senegal, Ukraine, France and the Russian Federation, as range states, were also present as well as BirdLife International. The Second Meeting of Signatories took place in Biebrza National Park, Poland, at the meeting France and Mali added their signatures and became signatories to the MoU. France is especially important, because the world population passes through France once or twice a year. Furthermore, the decided to extend the geographical coverage of the MoU to include an additional seven new countries in Europe and Africa. Finally, a new International Species Action Plan for the Aquatic Warbler and this plan helps to protect the species throughout its range and its breeding populations expand to other sites that had been lost in the past
5.
Antarctic Treaty System
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For the purposes of the treaty system, Antarctica is defined as all of the land and ice shelves south of 60°S latitude. The treaty was the first arms control agreement established during the Cold War, the Antarctic Treaty Secretariat headquarters have been located in Buenos Aires, Argentina, since September 2004. The main treaty was opened for signature on December 1,1959, the original signatories were the 12 countries active in Antarctica during the International Geophysical Year of 1957–58. These countries had established over 50 Antarctic stations for the IGY, the treaty was a diplomatic expression of the operational and scientific cooperation that had been achieved on the ice. Pursuant to Article 1, the treaty forbids any measures of a military nature and it prohibits all activities relating to mineral resources except scientific. A sixth annex on liability arising from environmental emergencies was adopted in 2005, the Antarctic Treaty Systems yearly Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meetings are the international forum for the administration and management of the region. Only 29 of the 53 parties to the agreements have the right to participate in decision-making at these meetings, as of 2015, there are 53 states party to the treaty,29 of which, including all 12 original signatories to the treaty, have consultative status. Consultative members include the seven nations that claim portions of Antarctica as national territory, the 46 non-claimant nations either do not recognize the claims of others, or have not stated their positions. Note, The table can be sorted alphabetically or chronologically using the icon, ** Reserved the right to claim areas. The Antarctic Treaty Secretariat was established in Buenos Aires, Argentina in September 2004 by the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting, jan Huber served as the first Executive Secretary for five years until August 31,2009. He was succeeded on September 1,2009, by Manfred Reinke, facilitating the exchange of information between the Parties required in the Treaty and the Environment Protocol. Collecting, storing, arranging and publishing the documents of the ATCM, providing and disseminating public information about the Antarctic Treaty system and Antarctic activities. Antarctica currently has no permanent population and therefore it has no citizenship nor government, all personnel present on Antarctica at any time are citizens or nationals of some sovereignty outside Antarctica, as there is no Antarctic sovereignty. The majority of Antarctica is claimed by one or more countries, the area on the mainland between 90 degrees west and 150 degrees west is the only major land on Earth not claimed by any country. Until 2015 the interior of the Norwegian Sector, the extent of which had never officially defined, was considered to be unclaimed. That year, Norway formally laid claim to the area between its Queen Maud Land and the South Pole, governments that are party to the Antarctic Treaty and its Protocol on Environmental Protection implement the articles of these agreements, and decisions taken under them, through national laws. The Antarctic Treaty is often considered to represent an example of the heritage of mankind principle. According to Argentine regulations, any crime committed within 50 kilometers of any Argentine base is to be judged in Ushuaia, in the part of Argentine Antarctica that is also claimed by Chile and UK, the person to be judged can ask to be transferred there
6.
Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic
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To the west it bordered Poland. Within the Soviet Union, it bordered Lithuania and Latvian to the north, the Socialist Soviet Republic of Byelorussia was declared by the Bolsheviks on 1 January 1919 following the declaration of independence by the Belarusian Democratic Republic in March 1918. In 1922, the BSSR was one of the four founding members of the Soviet Union, together with the Ukrainian SSR, the Transcaucasian SFSR, Byelorussia was one of several Soviet republics occupied by Nazi Germany during World War II. This non-sovereign country of several million was a UN-founding-member, towards the final years of the Soviet Republics existence, the Supreme Soviet of Byelorussian SSR adopted the Declaration of State Sovereignty on 27 July 1990. On 15 August 1991, Stanislau Shushkevich was elected as the countrys first president, ten days later on 25 August 1991, Byelorussian SSR declared its independence and renamed to the Republic of Belarus. The Soviet Union was dissolved four months later on December 26,1991 and this asserted that the territories are all Russian and all the peoples are also Russian, in the case of the Belarusians, they were variants of the Russian people. Following the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, the term White Russia caused some confusion as it was also the name of the force that opposed the red Bolsheviks. During the period of the Byelorussian SSR, the term Byelorussia was embraced as part of a national consciousness, in western Belarus under Polish control, Byelorussia became commonly used in the regions of Białystok and Grodno during the interwar period. Upon the establishment of the Byelorussian Socialist Soviet Republic in 1920, in 1936, with the proclamation of the 1936 Soviet Constitution, the republic was renamed to the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic transposing the second and third words. On August 25,1991 the Supreme Soviet of the Byelorussian SSR renamed the Soviet republic to the Republic of Belarus, conservative forces in the newly independent Belarus did not support the name change and opposed its inclusion in the 1991 draft of the Constitution of Belarus. Prior to the First World War, Belarusian lands were part of the Russian Empire, during the War, the Russian Western Fronts Great retreat in August/September 1915 ended with the lands of Grodno and most of Vilno guberniyas occupied by Germany. The abdication of the Tsar in light of the February Revolution in Russia in early 1917, as central authority waned, different political and ethnic groups strived for greater self-determination and even secession from the increasingly ineffective Russian Provisional Government. The momentum picked up after the incompetent actions of the 10th Army during the ill-fated Kerensky Offensive during the summer. On 26 November, the committee of workers, peasants and soldiers deputies for the Western Oblast was merged with the Western fronts executive committee. During the autumn 1917/winter of 1918, the Western Oblast was headed by Aleksandr Myasnikyan as head of the Western Oblasts Military Revolutionary Committee, Myasnikyan took over as chair of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Partys committee for Western Oblast and Moisey Kalmanovich as chair of the Obliskomzap. As a result, on 7th of December, when the first All-Belarusian congress convened, a cease-fire was quickly agreed and proper peace negotiations began in December. The German Operation Faustschlag was of immediate success and within 11 days, they were able to make a serious advance eastward, taking over Ukraine, Baltic states and this forced the Obliskomzap to evacuate to Smolensk. The Smolensk guberniya was passed to the Western Oblast, faced with the German demands, the Bolsheviks accepted their terms at the final Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, which was signed on 3 March 1918
7.
Apostille Convention
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It specifies the modalities through which a document issued in one of the signatory countries can be certified for legal purposes in all the other signatory states. Such a certification is called an apostille and it is an international certification comparable to a notarisation in domestic law, and normally supplements a local notarisation of the document. Apostilles are affixed by Competent Authorities designated by the government of a state which is party to the convention, a list of these authorities is maintained by the Hague Conference on Private International Law. Examples of designated authorities are embassies, ministries, courts or governments, for example, in the United States, the Secretary of State of each state and his or her deputies are usually competent authorities. In the United Kingdom, all apostilles are issued by the Foreign, to be eligible for an apostille, a document must first be issued or certified by an officer recognised by the authority that will issue the apostille. For example, in the US state of Vermont, the Secretary of State maintains specimen signatures of all notaries public, likewise, courts in the Netherlands are eligible of placing an apostille on all municipal civil status documents directly. In some cases, intermediate certifications may be required in the country in which the document originates before it will be eligible for an apostille, for example, in New York City, the Office of Vital Records is not directly recognised by the New York Secretary of State. As a consequence, the signature of the City Clerk must be certified by the County Clerk of New York County to make the birth certificate eligible for an apostille. In Japan all the documents are issued in Japanese language. In India the apostille certification can be obtained from the Ministry of External Affairs The apostille itself is a stamp or printed form consisting of 10 numbered standard fields. On the top is the text APOSTILLE, under which the text Convention de La Haye du 5 octobre 1961 is placed and this title must be written in French for the Apostille to be valid. In the numbered fields the following information is added, Country and this public document has been signed by acting in the capacity of bears the seal/stamp of Certified at the. Signature The information can be placed on the document itself, or attached to the document as an allonge, a State that has not signed the Convention must specify how foreign legal documents can be certified for its use. Two countries may have a convention on the recognition of each others public documents. In practice this means the document must be certified twice before it can have effect in the receiving country. The convention has 112 parties and is in force for all members of the European Union, the most recent state to accede to the convention is Chile. In 2005 The Hague Conference surveyed its members and produced a report in December 2008 which expressed concerns about Diplomas. The possible abuse of the system was highlighted Particularly troubling is the use of diploma mill qualifications to circumvent migration controls
8.
World Customs Organization
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The World Customs Organization is an intergovernmental organization headquartered in Brussels, Belgium. The WCO maintains the international Harmonized System goods nomenclature, and administers the technical aspects of the World Trade Organization Agreements on Customs Valuation, in 1947, thirteen European countries established a Study Group to examine customs issues identified by the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. This work led to the adoption in 1948 of the Convention establishing the Customs Co-operation Council, on January 26,1953, the CCC’s inaugural session took place with the participation of 17 founding members. WCO membership subsequently expanded to all regions of the globe. In 1994, the organization adopted its current name, the World Customs Organization, today, WCO members are responsible for customs controls in 180 countries representing more than 98 per cent of all international trade. The HS multipurpose goods nomenclature is used as the basis for customs tariffs and it comprises about 5,000 commodity groups, each identified by a six digit code arranged in a legal and logical structure with well-defined rules to achieve uniform classification. The WCO revised Kyoto Convention is sometimes confused with the Kyoto Protocol, 3) ATA Convention and the Convention on Temporary Admission. Both the ATA Convention and the Istanbul Convention are WCO instruments governing temporary admission of goods, the ATA system, which is integral to both Conventions, allows the free movement of goods across frontiers and their temporary admission into a customs territory with relief from duties and taxes. The goods are covered by a document known as the ATA carnet that is secured by an international guarantee system. 4) The Arusha Declaration on Customs Integrity was adopted in 1993, the Arusha Declaration is a non-binding instrument which provides a number of basic principles to promote integrity and combat corruption within customs administrations. 5) The SAFE Framework of Standards to Secure and Facilitate Global Trade was adopted in 2005, 6) The Columbus Program is a customs capacity building program works to promote customs modernization and implementation of their standards to secure and facilitate world trade. Because of its complexity, the WCO launched a capacity building program called the Columbus Programme which focuses on needs assessments for WCO Members using the WCO Diagnostic Framework tool. The WCO Secretariat is headed by a Secretary General, who is elected by the WCO membership to a five-year term, the current WCO Secretary General is Kunio Mikuriya from Japan, who took office on 1 January 2009. The WCO is governed by the Council, which brings together all Members of the Organization once a year, additional strategic and management guidance is provided by the Policy Commission and the Finance Committee
Byelorussian SSR
Soviet Union
Belarus. Where appropriate, articles should be placed in the subcategories. This category may contain articles about treaties concluded or ratified by Belarus since 25 December 1991, which was the date on which Belarus formally became independent from the Soviet Union and the Byelorussian SSR became the Republic of Belarus. Unless denounced, treaties that were ratified by the Byelorussian SSR remain in force for independent Belarus.