Saxony is located in southeastern Germany and has common borders with Poland, the Czech Republic as well as the federal lands of Bavaria, Thuringia, Saxony-Anhalt and Brandenburg.
Saxony occupies 5.6% of Germany's total area.
Its population is 4.3 million (6% of the German total).
There are 5,649 Russian citizens in Saxony, which accounts for 6.3% of the total number of foreigners there. The capital of Saxony is Dresden (population 504,000).
Major cities: Leipzig (506,000), Chemnitz (246,000), Zwikkau (97,000), Plauen (68,000) and Goerlitz (67,000).
The land is divided into three administrative districts with centres in Dresden, Leipzig and Chemnitz.
The original base of Saxony was the Meissen Mark formed from lands captured by German feudal lords from Slavic tribes in the 10th century. In 1089, it became the property of the House of Wettin which gradually came to be called Saxony. At various periods over its history Saxony belonged to Russia, Bohemia, Prussia and Sweden; it was part of a union with Poland, a part of the North German Alliance and the German Empire.
After the revolution of November 1918, Saxony became a land within the German Republic. In 1945, after the defeat of Nazi Germany, it was occupied by Soviet forces and then became a part of the GDR in 1949. Since October 1990, after the reunification of Germany, Saxony has been one of the German lands (states). Saxony was an industrial centre before the Second World War. The country's first steam locomotive was built in Chemnitz back in 1939. At present, Saxony is the most industrialised of the new federal lands.
It is also the birthplace of German porcelain. A recipe for porcelain production was invented in Dresden in 1709, and production of tableware began at the porcelain factory in Meissen within a year. The arts and crafts of the Ore Mountains include toys, lace and wood carving.
Saxony has a two-party government, a coalition of the CDU and SPD. The prime minister is Stanislav Tillich.
Represented at the Landtag (the local parliament) are: the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) with 55 seats, the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS, Left) with 31 seats, the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SDPG) with 13 seats, the NDPG with 12 seats, FDP with seven seats, and the Greens with six seats.
Saxony's economy grew by 11.9% between 2000 and 2007, the best economic performance among all the federal lands in Germany. The growth was driven by the dynamic development of the processing industry.
Saxony's industrial export quota has grown from 13% to 34% since 1995, the highest growth rate among the new federal lands.
However, unemployment in Saxony ran at 13.1% in 2007 (compared with the average 8.1% for Germany as a whole).
Saxony is emerging as a leading engineering centre specialising in the production of equipment for chemical, pharmaceutical and textile industries and new-generation printers. There are 53 companies solely engaged in bioengineering, which is gradually evolving into a production-oriented sector.
Major structural changes are underway in the auto industry. The modern plants belonging to Volkswagen, Porsche and BMW located in Saxony have turned it into a leading car-making region in Germany which, coupled with the production of car parts, accounts for more than 20% of Saxony's industrial output and 32% of its exports.
Saxony has modern microelectronics and informatics industries. The plants of the companies AMD, Infinion and Motorola have turned Saxony into a European microelectronics centre.
The well-developed infrastructure and logistics of Leipzig and the convergence of transport routes near the airport have made it an ideal place for the postal giant DHL. The Russian-Saxon project of transporting exports (about 60%) from the nearby Porsche plant to the United States by air has been operating for more than two years.
A Rapid Emergency Response Centre has been opened here jointly by the Volga-Dnieper Aviation Enterprise and the Russian-Ukrainian firm Ruslan-Salis GMBH registered in Leipzig. Jumbo AN-124-100 transport planes are operated by Russian maintenance and flight crews. Under the contract which expires in 2009, but may be prolonged until 2012, urgent shipments are carried out for EU and NATO countries which have signed corresponding contracts.
The Leipzig Fair is one of the best exhibition centres in Germany. In 2007, it was the venue for 40 exhibitions and 120 other events visited by 1.6 billion people.
The key imports from Russia are oil and natural gas and its exports to Russia are machines, cars and pharmaceuticals.
The Saxon-Russia partnership programme includes, along with Moscow where the Saxon economic contact office is located, St Petersburg, Kaluga, Nizhny Novgorod, Togliatti, Tatarstan and Bashkortostan.
Gazprom and the Leipzig concern Verbundnezgas are major contributors to trade between Saxony and the Russian regions.
Saxony has four universities, five higher art schools, four specialised institutions of higher education, the Professional Academy of Saxony and a number of private educational institutions, including the first and only Leipzig Higher Trade School (University) so far the only such school officially recognized in the new federal lands. Saxony has many research centres, including the Solid State Physics Institute (Dresden), Isotope and Radiation Research Institute (Leipzig), and the Rossendorf Research Centre. The new Max Planck Molecular Biology and Genetics Institute opened in Dresden in April 2002. Its 25 universities and institutions of higher education (more than in other new lands) have a student body of about 96,000. The best known among them is Leipzig University, one of the oldest in Europe (founded in 1409). Mikhail Lomonosov studied at the Freiberg Mining Academy.
Saxony has added a brilliant page to the history of German culture. Composers Johann Sebastian Bach, Karl Maria von Weber, Felix Mendelssohn-Bartoldi, Robert Schumann, Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss worked there. Saxony has a great number of cultural sites of interest: the operas of Dresden, Leipzig and Chemniz, and the famous Gewandhaus historical concert hall and symphony orchestra in Leipzig, various museums (about 280), architecture landmarks including the Zwinger Palace which houses the Dresden Picture Gallery, Albertinium with numerous paintings and sculptures and the Green Vaults (where the Saxon kings kept their treasures). In Leipzig, there is the St Alexis Church (architect V. Pokrovsky) which was dedicated on October 18, 1913 in memory of 22,000 Russian soldiers who died in the Battle of the Nations as well as a monument commemorating that battle designed by architect B. Schmidts and built in 1898-1913 to mark the centenary of the battle (October 18, 1813).
Saxony has a German-Russian St Alexander Society (Leipzig), the Pushkin Club (Chemnitz), the Friends of St Petersburg Club in Dresden and an NGO called Family Centre in Zwikkau.