World Freedom Day observed on Nov. 9 each year, brings back memories of the fall of the Berlin wall, an iconic event that marked the triumph of the U.S. in the decades-spanning Cold War with the USSR and its allies.

Towering over East and West Berlin, the wall separated the two regions based on democratic and communist beliefs and was built under the shadow of the Soviet Union's ruling of World War II era Europe, behind the notorious Iron Curtain.

In 1989, the Berlin Wall was demolished by demonstrating masses who opposed the repression of free speech and liberty, as well as East Germany being a stronghold of the Soviet Union that sustained a climate of political tyranny and economic backwardness and bureaucratic inefficiency during their rule.

World Freedom Day, which celebrates the fall of the Berlin Wall and the restoration of liberty, was first observed in 2001 by then-U.S. president George W. Bush.

On this day, 33 years since the historic event, let us remember the driving force behind it with a few quotes that champion free speech and freedom (courtesy: BrainyQuote)

1. "Liberty, when it begins to take root, is a plant of rapid growth." - George Washington
2. "Life without liberty is like a body without spirit." - Khalil Gibran
3. "Freedom is the open window through which pours the sunlight of the human spirit and human dignity." - Herbert Hoover
4. "For everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom." - Albert Einstein
5. "For to be free isn't merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others." - Nelson Mandela
6. "Is freedom anything else than the right to live as we wish? Nothing else." - Epictetus
7. "Freedom lies in being bold." - Robert Frost
8. The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep's throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty. Plainly, the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of liberty." - Abraham Lincoln
9. "I am no bird and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will." - Charlotte Bronte
10. "We must be free not because we claim freedom, but because we practise it." - William Faulkner
11. "Liberty cannot be preserved without general knowledge among the people." - John Adams

World Freedom Day marks the fall of
World Freedom Day marks the fall of Soviet Union Pixabay