Euro notes and coins
Twelve countries swap francs, marks and lire for one currency
On 1 January 2002 euro notes and coins entered circulation in twelve EU countries; the non-cash euro had existed since 1999. National currencies were withdrawn within two months.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 21st century
Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Whole world
- 1980 Smallpox declared eradicated — 22 years earlier
- 2008 Global financial crisis — 6 years later
Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1980 Solidarity — 22 years earlier
- 1985–1991 Perestroika — 17 years earlier
- 1986 Chernobyl disaster — 16 years earlier
- 1989 Revolutions of 1989 — 13 years earlier
- 1991 Dissolution of the Soviet Union — 11 years earlier
Middle East
- 1979 Iranian Revolution — 23 years earlier
- 1980–1988 Iran–Iraq War — 22 years earlier
- 1990–1991 Gulf War — 12 years earlier
Africa
- 1983–1985 The Ethiopian famine — 19 years earlier
- 1994 End of apartheid in South Africa — 8 years earlier
Asia
- 1984 Bhopal disaster — 18 years earlier
- 1989 Tiananmen Square protests — 13 years earlier
- 1991 Eruption of Mount Pinatubo — 11 years earlier
- 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami — 2 years later
- 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami — 9 years later
Americas
- 1983 Birth of the Internet: ARPANET adopts TCP/IP — 19 years earlier
- 1990 Launch of the Hubble Space Telescope — 12 years earlier
- 2001 September 11 attacks — 1 year earlier
- 2003 Human genome sequenced — 1 year later
- 2007 Apple unveils the iPhone — 5 years later
Oceania
- 1992 The Mabo decision — 10 years earlier
Alive at the time
- Nelson Mandela (aged 84)
- Neil Armstrong (aged 72)
- Ronald Reagan (aged 91)
- Edmund Hillary (aged 83)
- Jimmy Carter (aged 78)
- Fidel Castro (aged 76)
- Elizabeth II (aged 76)
- Gabriel García Márquez (aged 75)
- Mikhail Gorbachev (aged 71)
- Boris Yeltsin (aged 71)