Republic of Sakha (Yakutia)
The Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) is the largest administrative division in the Russian Federation in terms of area, as it occupies one-fifth of the country.
Yakutia spans three time zones, covering an area of 3,103,200 square kilometres (including the New Siberian Islands), 40% of which lies north of the Arctic Circle.
Mountains cover most of Yakutia's surface: the Verkhoyansk, Chersky and other mountain ranges, the Central Siberian Plateau in the west, the Yana and Oimyakon plateaus in the east, among others. In the north, the mountains slope down to the Yano-Indigirka and Kolyma lowlands.
Yakutia is one of Russia's richest regions in terms of water resources: there are about 700,000 rivers and over 800,000 lakes there. The Lena River, which flows for 4,400 kilometres, is the principal river of the region.
The climate is very harsh: the temperature range exceeds 100 degrees - from 40 degrees Celsius in summer to minus 60 C in winter. It is in Yakutia that the "cold pole" of the Northern Hemisphere is located: in 1933, the temperature of minus 67.7 C was recorded in Verkhoyansk.
The region is divided into four geographical areas: taiga forest (which covers almost 80% of Yakutia), a zone of forest mixed with tundra, tundra, and Arctic desert. Almost the entirety of Yakutia's mainland represents a zone of all-over permafrost that formed many centuries ago.
The Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) consists of 35 administrative divisions: 34 uluses (districts) and one municipal territory - Yakutsk.
The republic's population is 948,100, according to the 2002 census. The urban population makes up 64.2% of the total population, and the rural population is 35.8%. People of more than 120 nationalities live in Yakutia, including Yakuts - 45.5%, Russians - 41.1%, Ukrainians - 3.6%, Evenks - 1.9%, Evens - 1.2%, Tatars - 1.2%, and others.
Yakutia is Russia's richest region in terms of the diversity of its mineral resources (82% of diamonds, 17.2% of gold, 5% of coal, 6.2% of iron ore, 28% of tin, 81.5% of antimony, 61% of uranium, as well as natural gas and oil). Yakutia has the largest hydro-power potential in the Far East, what with more than one-fifth of all Russia's resources.
Yakutia is responsible for 25% of the world's rough diamond production and 24% of Russia's cut diamond market.
