Ukraine is marking 34 years of independence, and the country’s first generation of lawmakers and activists are reflecting on how early decisions shaped its struggle today.

Russia’s illegal seizure of the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine exactly 11 years ago on March 18, 2014, was quick and bloodless.

Leonid Kravchuk, who led Ukraine to independence during the collapse of the Soviet Union and served as its first president, has died at age 88.

When the leaders of the Soviet Union’s three Slavic republics met at a secluded hunting lodge near the Polish border on Dec. 8, 1991, they delivered a death blow to the USSR.