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Helsinki Final Act

Helsinki Final Act was a document signed by 35 nations Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe in Helsinki in 1975.

The document was at the time considered a mile-stone of detente between the east and the west.

All sides considered themselves as the winners of the agreement. In the west, acknowledgement of human rights as a valid issue by the east was considered a major coup, while the east thought that confirmation of existing borders as inviolable was a great relief. And the neutral and non-aligned countries of course delighted in the pure fact of such a major act of detente coming about at all.

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