Sevastopol, Ukraine

History : Ancient Chersonesus : Russian Empire : Crimean War : World War II : Ukrainian SSR : Ukraine : Occupation and annexation | Geography | Economy | Culture | Education

🇺🇦 Sevastopol (Севастополь) is the largest city in Crimea and a major port on the Black Sea. Due to its strategic location and the navigability of the city's harbours, Sevastopol has been an important port and naval base throughout its history. Since the city's founding in 1783 it has been a major base for the Black Sea Fleet, and it was previously a closed city during the Cold War. The city of Sevastopol is largely concentrated around Sevastopol Bay, with a total a larger conglomerate of surrounding towns and rural communities.

Sevastopol, along with the rest of Crimea, is internationally recognised as part of Ukraine, and under the Ukrainian legal framework the city enjoys special status.

Sevastopol's unique naval and maritime features have been the basis for a robust economy. The city enjoys mild winters and moderate warm summers, characteristics that help make it a popular seaside resort and tourist destination, mainly for visitors from the former Soviet republics. The city is also an important centre for marine biology research. In particular, the military has studied and trained dolphins in the city for military use since the 1960s.

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History: Ancient Chersonesus In the 6th century BC, a Greek colony was established in the area of the modern-day city. The Greek city of Chersonesus existed for almost two thousand years, first as an independent democracy and later as part of the Bosporan Kingdom. In the 13th and 14th centuries, it was sacked by the Golden Horde several times and was finally totally abandoned. The modern day city of Sevastopol has no connection to the ancient and medieval Greek city, but the ruins are a popular tourist attraction located on the outskirts of the city.

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History: Russian Empire Sevastopol was founded in June 1783 as a base for a naval squadron under the name Akhtiar (White Cliff), by Rear Admiral Thomas MacKenzie (Foma Fomich Makenzi), a native Scot in Russian service; soon after Russia annexed the Crimean Khanate. Five years earlier, Alexander Suvorov ordered that earthworks be erected along the harbour and Russian troops be placed there.

In February 1784, Catherine the Great ordered Grigory Potemkin to build a fortress there and call it Sevastopol. The realisation of the initial building plans fell to Captain Fyodor Ushakov who in 1788 was named commander of the port and of the Black Sea squadron. The city was established on western shore of Southern Bay which branches away from bigger Sevastopol Bay. The ruins of the ancient Chersonesus were situated to the west. The newly built settlement became an important naval base and later a commercial seaport. In 1797, under an edict issued by Emperor Paul I, the military stronghold was again renamed Akhtiar. Finally, on 29 April (10 May), 1826, the Senate returned the city's name to Sevastopol. In 1803 to 1864 along with Mykolaiv the city was part of Nikolayev–Sevastopol Military Governorate.

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History: Crimean War From 1853 to 1856, the Crimean peninsula's strategic position in controlling the Black Sea caused it to be the site of the principal engagements of the Crimean War, where Russia lost to a French-led alliance.

After a minor skirmish at Köstence (now Constanța), the allied commanders decided to attack Sevastopol as Russia's main naval base in the Black Sea. After extended preparations, allied forces landed on the peninsula in September 1854 and marched to a point south of Sevastopol after winning the Battle of the Alma on 20 September. The Russians counterattacked on 25 October in what became the Battle of Balaclava and were repulsed, but the British Army's forces were seriously depleted as a result. A second Russian counterattack, at Inkerman in November, ended in a stalemate as well. The front settled into the siege of Sevastopol, involving brutal conditions for troops on both sides.

Sevastopol finally fell after eleven months, after the French had assaulted Fort Malakoff. Isolated and facing a bleak prospect of invasion by the West if the war continued, Russia sued for peace in March 1856. France and Britain welcomed the development, owing to the conflict's domestic unpopularity. The Treaty of Paris, signed on 30 March 1856, ended the war and forbade Russia from basing warships in the Black Sea. This hampered the Russians during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78 and in the aftermath of that conflict, Russia moved to reconstitute its naval strength and fortifications in the Black Sea.

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History: World War II During World War II, Sevastopol withstood intensive bombardment by the Germans in 1941–42, supported by their Italian and Romanian allies during the Battle of Sevastopol. German forces used railway artillery—including history's largest-ever calibre railway artillery piece in battle, the 80-cm calibre Schwerer Gustav—and specialised mobile heavy mortars to destroy Sevastopol's extremely heavy fortifications, such as the Maxim Gorky Fortresses. After fierce fighting, which lasted for 250 days, the fortress city finally fell to Axis forces in July 1942. It was intended to be renamed to "Theodorichshafen" (in reference to Theodoric the Great and the fact that the Crimea had been home to Germanic Goths until the 18th or 19th century) in the event of a German victory against the Soviet Union, and like the rest of the Crimea was designated for future colonisation by the Third Reich. It was liberated by the Red Army on 9 May 1944 and was awarded the Hero City title a year later.

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History: Ukrainian SSR During the Soviet era, Sevastopol became a so-called "closed city". This meant that any non-residents had to apply to the authorities for a temporary permit to visit the city.

On 29 October 1948, the Presidium of Supreme Council of the Russian SFSR issued an ukaz (order) which confirmed the special status of the city. Soviet academic publications since 1954, including the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, indicated that Sevastopol, Crimean Oblast was part of the Ukrainian SSR.

In 1954, under Nikita Khrushchev, both Sevastopol and the remainder of the Crimean peninsula were administratively transferred from being territories within the Russian SFSR to being territories administered by the Ukrainian SSR. Administratively, Sevastopol was a municipality excluded from the adjacent Crimean Oblast. The territory of the municipality was 863.5 km² and it was further subdivided into four raions (districts). Besides the City of Sevastopol proper, it also included two towns—Balaklava (having had no status until 1957), Inkerman, urban-type settlement Kacha, and 29 villages.

For the 1955 Ukrainian parliamentary elections on 27 February, Sevastopol was split into two electoral districts, Stalinsky and Korabelny (initially requested three Stalinsky, Korabelny, and Nakhimovsky). Eventually, Sevastopol received two people's deputies of the Ukrainian SSR elected to the Verkhovna Rada, A. Korovchenko and M. Kulakov.

In 1957, the town of Balaklava was incorporated into Sevastopol.

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History: Ukraine Following Ukraine's declaration of independence from the USSR in 1991, Sevastopol became the principal base of the Ukrainian navy. As the key naval base of the former Soviet Black Sea Fleet, it was a source of tensions for Russia–Ukraine relations until a set-term lease agreement was signed in 1997.

On 10 July 1993, the Russian parliament passed a resolution declaring Sevastopol to be "a federal Russian city". At the time, many supporters of President Boris Yeltsin had ceased taking part in the parliament's work. On 20 July 1993, the United Nations Security Council denounced the decision of the Russian parliament. According to Anatoliy Zlenko, it was the first time that the council had to review and qualify actions of a legislative body.

On 14 April 1993, the Presidium of the Crimean Parliament called for the creation of the presidential post of the Crimean Republic. A week later, the Russian deputy, Valentin Agafonov, said that Russia was ready to supervise a referendum on Crimean independence and include the republic as a separate entity in the CIS. On 28 July 1993, one of the leaders of the Russian Society of Crimea, Viktor Prusakov, said that his organisation was ready for an armed mutiny and establishment of Russian administration of Sevastopol.

In September, the commander of the joint Russian-Ukrainian Black Sea Fleet, Eduard Baltin [ru], accused Ukraine of converting some of his fleet and conducting an armed assault on his personnel and threatened to take countermeasures placing the fleet on alert. (In June 1992, the Russian president Yeltsin and the Ukrainian president Leonid Kravchuk had agreed to divide the former Soviet Black Sea Fleet between Russia and Ukraine. Eduard Baltin had been appointed commander of the Black Sea Fleet by Yeltsin and Kravchuk on 15 January 1993.)

The Moscow mayor Yuriy Luzhkov campaigned to claim the city, and in December 1996, the Russian Federation Council officially endorsed the claim, threatening negotiations. In response, Ukraine proposed a "special partnership" with NATO in January 1997.

In May 1997, Russia and Ukraine signed the Russian–Ukrainian Friendship Treaty, ruling out Moscow's territorial claims to Ukraine. This was followed by the Partition Treaty on the Status and Conditions of the Black Sea Fleet on 28 May 1997. A separate agreement established the terms of a long-term lease of land, facilities, and resources in Sevastopol and the Crimea by Russia. Russia kept its naval base, with around 15,000 troops stationed in Sevastopol.

The ex-Soviet Black Sea Fleet and its facilities were divided between Russia's Black Sea Fleet and the Ukrainian Naval Forces. The two navies co-used some of the city's harbours and piers, while others were demilitarised or used by either country. Sevastopol remained the location of the Russian Black Sea Fleet headquarters, and the Ukrainian Naval Forces Headquarters were also located in the city. A judicial row periodically continued over the naval hydrographic infrastructure both in Sevastopol and on the Crimean coast (especially lighthouses historically maintained by the Soviet and Russian Navy and also used for civil navigation support).

As in the rest of Crimea, Russian remained the predominant language of the city, although following the independence of Ukraine there were some attempts at Ukrainisation, with very little success. Russian society in general and even some outspoken government representatives never accepted the loss of Sevastopol and tended to regard it as temporarily separated from Russia.

In July 2009, the chairman of the Sevastopol city council, Valeriy Saratov (Party of Regions), said that Ukraine should increase the amount of compensation it is paying to the city of Sevastopol for hosting the foreign Russian Black Sea Fleet, instead of requesting such compensation from the Russian government and the Russian Ministry of Defense in particular.

On 27 April 2010, Russia and Ukraine ratified the Russian Ukrainian Naval Base for Gas treaty, which extended the Russian Navy's lease of Crimean facilities for 25 years after 2017 (through 2042) with the option to prolong the lease in five-year extensions. The ratification process in the Ukrainian parliament encountered stiff opposition and even resulted in a brawl in the parliament chamber. Eventually, the treaty was ratified by a 52% majority vote—236 of 450. The Russian Duma ratified the treaty by a 98% majority.

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History: Occupation and annexation On 23 February 2014, a pro-Russian rally took place in Nakhimov Square declaring allegiance to Russia and protesting against the new government in Kyiv following the overthrow of the president, Viktor Yanukovych. On 27 February, pro-Russian militia, including Russian troops, seized control of government buildings in Crimea, and by 28 February, controlled other strategic locations such as the military airport in Sevastopol.

On 16 March 2014, an internationally unrecognised referendum was held in Sevastopol with official results claiming an 89.51% turnout and 95.6% of voters choosing to join Russia. Ukraine and almost all other countries of the United Nations General Assembly consider the referendum illegal and illegitimate.

On 18 March, Russia annexed Crimea, incorporating the Republic of Crimea and federal city of Sevastopol as federal subjects of Russia. However, the annexation remains internationally unrecognised, with most countries recognizing Sevastopol as a city with special status within Ukraine. While Russia has taken defacto control of Sevastopol and Crimea, the international community considers the area part of Ukraine.

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Geography The city of Sevastopol is located at the south-western tip of the Crimean peninsula in a headland known as Heracles peninsula on a coast of the Black Sea. The city is designated a special city-region of Ukraine which besides the city itself includes several of its outlying settlements. The city itself is concentrated mostly in the western portion of the region and around the long Bay of Sevastopol. This bay is a ria, a river canyon drowned by Holocene sea-level rise, and the outlet of Chorna River. Away in a remote location south-east of Sevastopol is located the former city of Balaklava (since 1957 incorporated within Sevastopol), the bay of which in Soviet times served as a main port for the Soviet diesel-powered submarines.

The coastline of the region is mostly rocky, in a series of smaller bays, a great number of which are located within the Bay of Sevastopol. The biggest of them are Southern Bay (within the Bay of Sevastopol), Archer Bay, a gulf complex that consists of Deergrass Bay, the Bay of Cossack, Salty Bay, and many others. There are over thirty bays in the immediate region.

Through the region flow three rivers: the Belbek, Chorna, and Kacha. All three mountain chains of Crimean mountains are represented in Sevastopol, the southern chain by the Balaklava Highlands, the inner chain by the Mekenziev Mountains, and the outer chain by the Kara-Tau Upland (Black Mountain).

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Economy Apart from navy-related civil facilities, Sevastopol hosts some other notable industries. An example is Stroitel, one of the leading plastic manufacturers.

The city received millions of US Dollars in compensation for hosting the Russian Black Sea Fleet from the Russian and the Ukrainian government.

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Culture There are many historical buildings in the central and eastern parts of the city and Balaklava, some of which are architectural monuments. The Western districts have modern architecture. More recently, numerous skyscrapers have been built. Balaklava Bayfront Plaza (on hold), currently under construction, will be one of the tallest buildings in Ukraine, at 173 m (568 ft) with 43 floors.

After the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea the city's monument to Petro Konashevych-Sahaidachny was removed and handed over to Kharkiv.

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Education • Economics and Humanities Institute (Branch), Crimean Federal University • Sevastopol National Technical University • Sevastopol National University of Nuclear Energy and Industry.

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Europe/Simferopol/Sevastopol_City 
<b>Europe/Simferopol/Sevastopol_City</b>
Image: Photo by Andrey Che on Unsplash

Sevastopol has a population of over 429,922 people. Sevastopol also forms the centre of the wider Sevastopol metropolitan area which has a population of over 509,992 people.

To set up a UBI Lab for Sevastopol see: https://www.ubilabnetwork.org Twitter: https://twitter.com/UBILabNetwork

Twin Towns - Sister Cities Sevastopol has links with:

🇷🇺 Belgorod, Russia 🇷🇴 Galați, Romania 🇷🇺 Novosibirsk, Russia, until 2022 🇬🇪 Poti, Georgia 🇷🇺 Saint Petersburg, Russia, until 2022 🇬🇪 Sukhumi, Georgia 🇷🇺 Vologda, Russia
Text Atribution: Wikipedia Text under CC-BY-SA license

Antipodal to Sevastopol is: -146.473,-44.605

Locations Near: Sevastopol 33.5273,44.6053

🇺🇦 Bakhchysarai 33.862,44.758 d: 31.5  

🇺🇦 Saky 33.604,45.14 d: 59.8  

🇺🇦 Yevpatoriya 33.367,45.183 d: 65.5  

🇺🇦 Evpatoria 33.367,45.183 d: 65.5  

🇺🇦 Yevpatoria 33.361,45.198 d: 67.2  

🇺🇦 Yalta 34.157,44.502 d: 51.2  

🇺🇦 Simferopol 34.102,44.951 d: 59.5  

🇺🇦 Dzhankoi 34.383,45.7 d: 139  

🇺🇦 Feodosiya 35.379,45.049 d: 154.1  

🇺🇦 Feodosia 35.379,45.049 d: 154.1  

Antipodal to: Sevastopol -146.473,-44.605

🇵🇫 Papeete -149.566,-17.537 d: 16991.4  

🇹🇴 Nuku'alofa -175.216,-21.136 d: 16308.1  

🇦🇸 Pago Pago -170.701,-14.279 d: 15940.8  

🇼🇸 Apia -171.76,-13.833 d: 15841.2  

🇺🇸 Hilo -155.089,19.725 d: 12808.5  

🇺🇸 Maui -156.446,20.72 d: 12680.9  

🇺🇸 Maui County -156.617,20.868 d: 12662.2  

🇺🇸 Kahului -156.466,20.891 d: 12661.7  

🇺🇸 Wailuku -156.505,20.894 d: 12660.9  

🇺🇸 Honolulu -157.85,21.3 d: 12596.1  

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