In this task, you are given a question and a context passage. You have to answer the question based on the given passage.
Q: What did the dictator do for his country?, Context: Sassou Nguesso aligned the country with the Eastern Bloc and signed a twenty-year friendship pact with the Soviet Union. Over the years, Sassou had to rely more on political repression and less on patronage to maintain his dictatorship.
A: 
aligned the country with the Eastern Bloc and signed a twenty-year friendship pact with the Soviet Union