The people’s revolutions of 1989 were not the unalloyed success for the cause of freedom and democracy that was claimed for them at the time, writes Geoffrey Roberts

“If I have one regret,” my friend Patricia said, “it’s that I lived in Paris in the summer of 1968, and it all went over my head.”

Here is your lunchtime bulletin...

The architect behind some of Britain’s foremost modern buildings has died in his native Prague, it was announced today.

NATO took a giant step forward yesterday, welcoming seven former Communist countries into the military alliance and paving the way for a 20,000-strong rapid reaction force.