<P> On December 7 , 1989 , the Communist Party of Lithuania under the leadership of Algirdas Brazauskas , split from the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and abandoned its claim to have a constitutional `` leading role '' in politics . A smaller loyalist faction of the Communist Party , headed by hardliner Mykolas Burokevičius , was established and remained affiliated with the CPSU . However , Lithuania 's governing Communist Party was formally independent from Moscow 's control -- a first for Soviet Republics and a political earthquake that prompted Gorbachev to arrange a visit to Lithuania the following month in a futile attempt to bring the local party back under control . The following year , the Communist Party lost power altogether in multiparty parliamentary elections which had caused Vytautas Landsbergis to become the first non-Communist president of Lithuania since its forced incorporation into the USSR . </P>
<P> On December 7 , 1989 , the Communist Party of Lithuania under the leadership of Algirdas Brazauskas , split from the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and abandoned its claim to have a constitutional `` leading role '' in politics . A smaller loyalist faction of the Communist Party , headed by hardliner Mykolas Burokevičius , was established and remained affiliated with the CPSU . However , Lithuania 's governing Communist Party was formally independent from Moscow 's control -- a first for Soviet Republics and a political earthquake that prompted Gorbachev to arrange a visit to Lithuania the following month in a futile attempt to bring the local party back under control . The following year , the Communist Party lost power altogether in multiparty parliamentary elections which had caused Vytautas Landsbergis to become the first non-Communist president of Lithuania since its forced incorporation into the USSR . </P>
first country to declare independence from the soviet union
first country to declare independence from the soviet union
Lithuania
Lithuania