List of state leaders deposed by foreign powers in the 20th and 21st century

This is a list of heads of state and governments deposed by a foreign power. The list is chronological.

List Head of State or Government CountryTitleDeposed byDateOperationNotesRefEmilio AguinaldoPresident23 March 1901Philippine–American WarPaul KrugerState President31 May 1902Second Boer WarThe Orange Free State and the South African Republic were forced to surrender their sovereignty in the Treaty of Vereeniging to become colonies of the British Empire, but were promised an autonomous civilian government, and the colonies later merged with Cape Colony and Natal to form the Union of South Africa in 1910. Kruger had lived in exile from 7 May 1900 onward.Schalk Willem BurgerActing State PresidentChristiaan de WetState PresidentGojong of KoreaEmperor19 July 1907Occupation of KoreaSunjong of Korea29 August 1910Essad Toptani AlbaniaPrime MinisterFebruary 1916Balkan Front of World War IToptani fled Albania during Great Retreat of the Serbian forces and the Austrian occupation of Northern Albania. Despite being a fellow member of the Entente, France founded the Republic of Korçë without Toptani's involvement.Mykhailo HrushevskyPresident of the Central Rada29 April 1918Ukrainian coup d'étatUkraine was occupied by the Central Powers. After the relations worsened, Pavlo Skoropadsky staged a coup with German backing.Vsevolod HolubovychPrime MinisterFerdinand I of BulgariaTsar30 September 1918 Vardar OffensiveBulgaria reached the verge of revolution from the Agrarian Union due to the breakdown of the Bulgarian Army, and became the first state in the Central Powers of World War I to surrender to the Allied Powers. After the Armistice of Salonica, Tsar Ferdinand I abdicated in favor his son Boris III and the Agrarian Union's leader Aleksandar Stamboliyski became Prime Minister.Talaat PashaGrand Vizier2 November 1918Middle Eastern theatre of World War IPasha was a member of the Committee of Union and Progress controlling the politics of the late Ottoman Empire, and fled the country due to its loss of World War I and after the Armistice of Mudros. Backlash against the unpopular terms of the Treaty of Sèvres later lead to the fall of Sultan Mehmed VI and the Empire's replacement by the Republic of Turkey. Charles I of AustriaEmperor/King11 November 1918Battle of Vittorio VenetoThe battle resulted in a rout of the Austro-Hungarian Army, which agreed to the Armistice of Villa Giusti., Despite Charles's attempts to alleviate famine and grant a federalist constitution, he was unable to stop the declaration of the Republic of German-Austria and "relinquish(ed) every participation in the administration of the State", though did not formally abdicate. Charles IV of Hungary's attempts to retake the throne in Hungary would later be blocked by the Allied Powers and Miklos Horthy.Kaiser Wilhelm IIEmperor28 November 1918Hundred Days OffensiveWilhelm II abdicated due to pressures from the war and the German Revolution. He lived in the Netherlands, which refused the Allies' extradition request for a war crimes trial under the Treaty of Versailles, until the end of his life.Gyula PeidlPrime Minister6 August 1919Hungarian–Romanian WarDeposed in a right-wing coup amid a Romanian occupation of Budapest.Mammad Hasan HajinskiPrime Minister28 May 1920Red Army invasion of AzerbaijanLater formed into the Transcaucasian Socialist Federative Soviet RepublicSimon VratsianPrime Minister2 December 1920Red Army invasion of ArmeniaNoe ZhordaniaPrime Minister18 March 1921Red Army invasion of GeorgiaHusseinCaliph19 December 1925Saudi conquest of HejazSultan of Nejd Ibn Saud adopted the titles King of Hejaz and Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques in 1926 which had been used by the Hashemites.AliKingHaile Selassie IEmperor2 May 1936Occupation of EthiopiaSelassie would be restored to power in the East African Campaign of World War II after a period of exile in Bath, United Kingdom.Kurt SchuschniggChancellor11 March 1938AnschlussEdvard BenešPresident5 October 1938German occupation of CzechoslovakiaJan SyrovýPrime Minister1 December 1938Zog I of AlbaniaKing7 April 1939Occupation of AlbaniaAvgustyn VoloshynPresident18 March 1939Occupation of Carpatho-UkraineFelicjan Sławoj SkładkowskiPrime Minister 28 September 1939Invasion of PolandWładysław Sikorski and Władysław Raczkiewicz would later lead the Polish government-in-exile headquartered at various times in Paris, Angers, and London. They would be prevented from returning after World War II due to the Allies' recognition of the Provisional Government of National Unity.Ignacy MościckiPresidentKārlis UlmanisPresidentJuly 21, 1940Occupation of the Baltic statesAntanas SmetonaPresidentKonstantin PätsPrime MinisterJüri UluotsPresidentJohan NygaardsvoldPrime Minister9 April 1940Operation WeserübungPrime Minister Nygaardsvold and King Haakon VII would continue to lead the Norwegian government-in-exile, and would be restored to power after the Liberation of Finnmark and Operation Doomsday.Haakon VIIKingCharlotte Grand Duchess 10 May 1940Occupation of LuxembourgGrand Duchess Charlotte and Prime Minister Dupong continued to lead the Luxembourg government in exile in 27 Wilton Crescent in London, and would be restored at the end of the war.Pierre DupongPrime MinisterDirk Jan de GeerPrime Minister15 May 1940Occupation of the NetherlandsPrime Minister Jan de Geer and Queen Wilhelmina lead the Dutch government in exile in London and would be restored at the end of the war.WilhelminaQueenHubert PierlotPrime Minister 24 May 1940Invasion of BelgiumPrime Minister Pierlot continued to lead the Belgian government in exile in Eaton Square, London, and would be restored by the liberation of Belgium.Albert LebrunPresident22 June 1940Battle of FrancePaul ReynaudPrime MinisterEmmanouil TsouderosPrime Minister24 May 1941Occupation of GreeceKing George II continued to be recognized by the Greek government-in-exile, and was restored to power after the withdrawal of the Germans, the Greek Civil War, and the 1946 referendum restoring the monarchy.George IIKingRashid Ali al-GaylaniPrime Minister 2 May 1941Anglo-Iraqi WarPeter II YugoslaviaKing 13 April 1941Occupation of YugoslaviaKing Peter II would continue to lead the Yugoslav government-in-exile headquartered at Claridge's Hotel, London, but would be prevented from returning due to the Allies' recognition of Democratic Federal Yugoslavia.Dušan SimovićPrime MinisterReza Shah PahlaviShah16 September 1941Anglo-Soviet invasion of IranReza Shah's son Mohammad Reza Pahlavi would come to power after the 1953 Iranian coup d'état. Philippe PétainChief of StateJune–July 1944Operation OverlordPetain fled to Sigmaringen and formed a government-in-exile before being captured by Provisional Government of the French Republic forces and being convicted for collaboration with the Axis Powers. On the account of his service to the country during World War I, de Gaulle commuted the sentence to life in prison.

Laval was taken in custody by German forces in August 1944 after refusing to continue to serve the remnants of Vichy France and later fled to Spain, where he asked Franco for asylum. Franco suggested he should move on to a different neutral country, but Laval preferred to stay in Spain, from where he was handed over to the Allies in 1945. Back in France, he was tried and executed. Pierre LavalPrime Minister Konstantin MuravievPrime Minister9 September 19441944 Bulgarian coup d'étatMuraviev was only in charge of the country for a week, from 2 to 9 September and despite trying to cut ties with the Axis, he stopped short of declaring war on Germany until after 5 September, when the USSR used this as a reason to declare war on Bulgaria and install their own government. Miklós Horthy Regent15 October 1944Operation PanzerfaustAfter receiving word that Hungary's Regent, Admiral Miklós Horthy, was secretly negotiating his country's surrender to the advancing Red Army, he sent commando leader Otto Skorzeny of the Waffen-SS to capture Horthy and topple his governmentBenito MussoliniDuce1 May 1945Italian CampaignBenito Mussolini had previously been voted out of office by the Grand Council of Fascism in the Kingdom of Italy and dismissed and arrested on the orders of King Victor Emmanuel III and Pietro Badoglio. Ferenc SzálasiLeader of the Nation7 May 1945Nagykanizsa–Körmend OffensiveAnte PavelićPoglavnik7 May 1945After the capitulation of Germany, Pavelić fled first to Italy and then to South America, where he lived until 1957, when he was shot several times by a Serbian patriot. He moved to Spain, where he died a couple of years later due to the wounds from the assassination attemptVidkun QuislingMinister President9 May 1945Petsamo–Kirkenes OffensiveQuisling had served as a puppet head of state under the Reichskommissariat Norwegen. As the Allies were advancing through Norway, Quisling surrendered himself in to the police and was later tried and executed. The word "quisling" became a byword for "collaborator" or "traitor" in several languages since his deathOperation DoomsdayKarl DönitzPresident23 May 1945Western Allied invasion of GermanyDönitz's predecessor Adolf Hitler had committed suicide eight days earlier to avoid surrender. After the war, he was sentenced to ten years' imprisonment and was for nearly seven decades the only head of state to be convicted by an international tribunalEastern FrontLapland WarAisin-Gioro PuyiEmperor15 August 1945Soviet invasion of ManchuriaThe Japanese puppet-state of Manchukuo capitulated five days after the Japanese surrender, with Pu Yi imprisoned first by the Soviet and then handed over to China, where he was released in 1959 following a general amnesty.