Kazakstan ???
The Republic of Kazakstan (until December 1991, the
Kazakh SSR) is the second largest of the former Soviet
Republics, extending some 1.900 km (1.200 miles) from the
Volga river in the west to the Altai mountains in the east,
and about 1.300 km (800 miles) from the Siberian plain in the
north to the Central Asian deserts in the south. Western
geographers consider Kazakstan to be the northernmost
of five Central Asian republics, but Soviet geographers, for
historical reasons, do not include it in their concept of
Central Asia. To the south it borders the Republics of
Turkmenestan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. To the east
there is an international frontier with the People's Republic
of China. There is a long border in the north with the
Russian Federation and a 2.320 km coastline on the Caspian
Sea in the south-west. The total area is 2.717.300 sq-km
(1.049.155 sq-miles), over four-fifths the size of India (but
with only 2% of the population).
The relief is extremely varied. Lowlands account for more
than one-third of the territory, mountainous regions cover
nearly one-fifth and hilly plains and plateaus occupy the
rest of the Republic. The Western regions are dominated
by the lowlands of the Caspian Depression, which is drained
by the river Ural. To the east of the western lowlands is
the vast Turan plain, much of which is sparsely inhabited
desert. The flat north-central regions are the beginning of
the West Siberian plain; to the south of the plain are the
hilly uplands of central Kazakstan. On the eastern and
south-eastern borders there are high mountain ranges. The
major rivers are the Irtysh, which rises in the north-east
of the Republic and flows north, across Siberia, and empties
into the Arctic Ocean; the Ural, in the west, which flows
south into the Caspian Sea; and the Syr-Dar'ya, which rises
in the Tien Shan mountain range and empties into the Aral
Sea. The waters of the Syr-Dar'ya have been extensively
used for irrigation, causing serious desiccation of the Aral
Sea, the northern part of which is in Kazakstan.
The climate is of strongly continental type but there
are wide variations throughout the territory. Average tem-
peratures in January range from -18C (0F) in the north
to -3C (27F) in the south. In July average temperatures
are 19C (66F) in the north and 28-30C (82-86F) in the
south. Levels of precipitation are equally varied. Average
annual rainfall in mountainous regions reaches 1.600 mm,
where as in the central desert areas it is less then 100 mm.
According to the census of 1989, at which the total
population was 16.538.000, Kazaks formed the largest
ethnic group in the Republic, with 39.7% of the population,
but they were only slightly more numerous than the Russi-
ans (37.8%), who had formed a majority of the population
at the 1979 census. Other major ethnic groups are Germans
(5.8%) and Ukrainians (5.4%). There are also Tatars and
small numbers of Uighurs, Koreans (deported from the
Soviet Far East in the late 1930s) and Dungans (Chinese
Muslims who migrated to Russia-held territory after the
anti-Manzhou Muslim uprising of 1862-77).
Kazak, a member of the Central Turkish group of languages
, replaced Russian as the official language in Septem-
ber 1989. From 1940 to 1996 it has been written in the Cyrillic script.
A Latin script is used now, the traditional Arabic script having been
replaced in 1929. The predominant religion is Islam; Kazaks are Sunni
Muslims of the Hanafi school. Other ethnic groups have their own religious
communities, notably the (Christian) Eastern
Orthodox Church, which is attended mainly by Slavs.
The total population at 1 January 1991 was estimated to be 16.793.000.
The large areas of desert account for the low population density of 6.2
persons per sq-km in 1991. In 1989 57% of the population lived in urban
areas. The new capital is Aqmola, but the largest city is Almaty,
which had an estimated population of 1.151.300
in January 1990. It is situated in the extreme south-east of
the Republic, near the border with Kyrgyzstan. Other
important cities include Petropavlovsk, near the border
with the Russian Federation, and Karaganda, an industrial city in central
Kazakstan
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KP International ©® 1996 Timur Insepov
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