Thirty years since dissolution of Comecon East Bloc economic organisation
The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance, commonly known as the Comecon, was headed by the USSR and was meant to deliver prosperity to the whole Eastern Bloc. At its final session on June 28, 1991 an agreement was reached to dissolve it in 90 days.
The rigidly centralised Comecon was established by Stalin at a meeting in Moscow in 1949 and followed an economic embargo on Communist-ruled states by Western European states and the USA. The founding states included Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania and the USSR. Albania (1949–1962) and the GDR (1950–1990) were also members. Mongolia joined in 1962, Cuba 10 years later and Vietnam in 1978.
The Comecon had mighty ambitions. However in reality it often saw meaningless decisions, such as entrusting the production of advanced electronics to Bulgaria. In agricultural Romania, on the other hand, ironworks were built, to which iron and coal had to be imported from afar. In Czechoslovakia the focus was mainly on heavy industry.
