Sevastopol

Sevastopol (Russian and Ukrainian: Севастóпoль, Sevastópol′; Crimean Tatar: Акъяр, Aqyar) is a port city located on the Crimean peninsula (disputed between Russia and Ukraine), the most populous of the entire peninsula with 344,144 inhabitants (2014 data). It is the base of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Navy.

Her political status is disputed. Currently, Russia administers and governs the city under the status of a federal city, but it is not recognized by Ukraine, nor by the international community, nor by the UN, since its secession and reincorporation into Russia was carried out without respecting Ukrainian legislation. and therefore it is considered "illegal", so according to Ukrainian jurisdiction the territory continues to make up a city with special status. The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine approved on April 15, 2014, with 228 votes in favor of a total of 450, a law that defines as "territories under temporary occupation" the Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol. The regulation indicated that these territories are an "inalienable part" of Ukraine and are subject to Ukrainian law, but states that Russia must compensate the economic damage of the annexation and answer for any human rights violations that occur on the peninsula.

According to the Law on New Federal Territories of the Russian Federation, the city can be considered part of Russia from the moment of the signing of the interstate agreement on March 18.

Sevastopol also has the title of Heroic City, due to its role during World War II.

Etymology

Sebastopol is a name formed from the Greek Sebastópolis, that is, August City (or imperial). It is made up of the adjective σεβαστός (sebastos, 'venerable') and the noun πόλις (pólis) ('city'). Σεβαστός is the equivalent among the Greek-speaking peoples of the Roman Empire of the honorary title of Octavian; Augustus, which became part of the official title of the Roman emperors, then the Byzantines and was used by the monarchs of the states that were considered his successors; the Holy Roman Empire and the Russian Empire.

Sebastopolis, despite its structure, is not the ancient name of the city (which was called Chersonese) but was created as an imitation in homage to Empress Catherine II, the Great, who ordered its foundation in 1783 and He visited it in 1787, accompanied by the Austrian Emperor Joseph II.

History

Kherson

In the place where Sevastopol is currently located, it existed since the V century B.C. C. a Greek colony called Chersonesus (Χερσόνησος), which was later conquered by the Romans in 114 AD. c.

Sevastopol, Department of Image Collections, National Gallery of Art Library, Washington, DC

Later it was part of the Roman Empire and its continuation; the Byzantine Empire, when it was called Cherson (transliterated Cherson) until the 15th century.

According to tradition, it was evangelized by the apostle Saint Andrew in the I century and a popular legend tells that the third pope, Saint Clement of Rome was deported to the Tauric Chersonese (present-day Crimea) where he died a martyr by being thrown into the sea with an anchor tied around his neck. On September 16, 655, Pope Martin I was also exiled and died in Chersonese.

In 988, the city was taken by Prince Vladimir I of kyiv, who, according to legend, along with his retinue, converted to Orthodoxy here.

It was destroyed by the army of the Golden Horde in the 15th century and its territory was first controlled by the Principality of Theodore, and in 1475-1781 by the Crimean Khanate, a vassal of the Ottoman Empire.

Russian Empire

British Complex, Sebastopol, Department of Image Collections, National Gallery of Art Library, Washington, DC

At the end of the Russo-Turkish War with Russia's victory in 1774, the Crimean Khanate was recognized as an independent national state under the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca between the Russian Empire and the Ottoman Empire, but was formally annexed by the Russian Empire in 1783. The same year Sevastopol was founded by Grigory Potemkin during Catherine II of Russia's annexation of Crimea to the Russian Empire, in order to become an important naval base and later an active port.

View of the monument to the defenders of the city during the war of Crimea, and in particular to Lieutenant General E. I. Tooritlebin (E.. Тотлебин).

Sevastopol was first besieged during the Crimean War by the United Kingdom and France, falling after 11 months of intense siege (1854-1855). The "Sevastopol Tales" by Liev Tolstoy situate us in the Crimean War (1853-1856), more specifically in the siege of Sevastopol, in whose defense he participated as an artillery officer in the fourth defensive bastion.

In the last phase of the Russian civil war, which took place from 1918 to 1920, the port city was the headquarters of the White Army under the command of Baron Piotr Nikolayevich Wrangel.

Soviet times

Between 1921 and 1941 the city was part of the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic.

During World War II, Sevastopol suffered another 250-day siege in 1941-42, in which the Soviet army was encircled along with the civilian population by Nazi German troops. When the city fell, most of the population was exterminated, but when the tide of the war was reversed, Soviet troops annihilated German troops in 1944. By virtue of the siege, Sevastopol was granted the title of Hero City in 1945.

After the Autonomous Republic was dissolved, the city did not belong to the Crimean Oblast, but formed its own administrative unit. In 1957 the city of Balaklava was incorporated into Sevastopol.

Under Ukrainian administration

After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the city remained under Russian sovereignty, while the rest of the Crimean peninsula remained part of Ukraine as an autonomous republic. In 1997, Russia ceded the city to Ukraine in exchange for allowing Russia to keep a military base in the city until 2042.

Since then, the city was administratively a municipality excluded from the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, but an integral part of the territory of Ukraine. The territory of the municipality is 863.5 km² and is subdivided into four raions (districts).

Crimea crisis and annexation to Russia

On March 6, 2014, Sevastopol unilaterally declared itself a federal subject of the Russian Federation. On March 11, the Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol declared their independence from Ukraine. Sevastopol City Council members voted on March 17 in favor of the integration of the city into the Russian Federation, with the same status as the cities of Moscow and Saint Petersburg.

On March 16, 2014, a referendum was held in Sevastopol in which 89.51% of registered citizens voted, of which 95.6% answered yes to the question “Are you in favor of unification? of the Crimean peninsula with Russia as a subject of the Federation?".

On March 21, 2014, President Vladimir Putin signed the law that formalized the annexation of the Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol to the Russian Federation, a law that had been previously approved by the Federation Council and the State Duma and declared legitimate by the Constitutional Court. Previously, on March 18, the annexation agreements had been signed. Alexei Chaly, who was serving as acting mayor, signed on behalf of Sevastopol.

Russia-Ukraine naval base dispute

Black Sea Fleet (Russian Burn) in Sevastopol.

In accordance with a 1997 treaty, the Russian Black Sea Fleet was stationed in the city. At first Russia did not recognize Ukrainian sovereignty over Crimea, further arguing that the city had never been integrated into Ukraine as it was subject to the status of a military base. Ukraine's sovereignty over the entire territory was finally recognized in 1997. In 2010 the lease was extended until 2042. Since Sevastopol's integration into Russia in 2014, all these agreements are null and void, with sovereignty corresponding to total over the city to Russia. Due to this, the agreements were revoked by Russia.

In March 2014 Sevastopol declared its independence (along with the Republic of Crimea), and days later it returned to depend on Moscow 23 years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

Geography

Satellite image of the Sebastopol area.

The city of Sevastopol is located at the southwestern tip of the Crimean peninsula, on a promontory known as the Heracles Peninsula on the Black Sea coast. The city itself is mostly concentrated in the western part of the region and along the Sevastopol Bay. This bay is an estuary, a canyon flooded by rising sea levels during the Holocene, and the mouth of the Chorna River. To the southeast of Sevastopol is the old city of Balaklava (since 1957 incorporated into Sevastopol), a bay that in Soviet times served as the main port for Soviet diesel submarines.

The region's coastline is mainly rocky, in a series of small coves, a large number of which lie within Sebastopol Bay. There are more than thirty bays in the immediate region. Three rivers flow through the region: the Belbek, the Chorna and the Kacha. The three mountain ranges of the Crimean Mountains are represented in Sevastopol. Near the city is also Cape Aya.

Climate

Sebastopol has a humid subtropical climate (Cfa in the Köppen climate classification), similar to that of the southeastern United States, the Río de la Plata basin, or eastern China.

The average annual temperature is 15 °C during the day and around 8 °C at night. In the coldest months, January and February, the average temperature is 4 °C during the day and around -6 °C at night. In the hottest months, July and August, the average temperature is around 24°C during the day and around 17°C at night. In general, the summer season lasts for 5 months, from around mid-May to September, when the temperature usually reaches 20°C or more in the first half of October. The average precipitation is around 460 millimeters per year. There are about 2345 hours of sunshine a year.

Average climatic parameters of Sebastopol
Month	Ene.	Feb.	Mar.	Open up.	May.	Jun.	Jul.	Ago.	Sep.	Oct.	Nov.	Dec.	Annual
Average temperature (°C)	5.9	6.0	8.9	13.6	20.5	24.7	27.3	26.9	22.6	17.1	11.9	8.1	16.1
Average temperature (°C)	2.9	2.8	5.4	9.8	15.7	19.7	22.1	22.1	17.5	12.6	8.2	5.0	12
Temp. medium (°C)	-0.2	-0.4	2.0	6.1	10.9	14.8	17.1	17.9	12.5	8.1	4.5	2.0	7.9
Total precipitation (mm)	57	46	42	36	39	54	44	47	46	41	57	74	583
Days of precipitation (≥)	12	11	10	10	9	9	7	8	7	9	11	13	116
Hours of sun	93	87	155	180	248	300	310	279	240	186	90	62	2230
Source #1: weather2travel.com
Source No. 2: Climate-Data.org

Political status and subdivisions

Administrative Division of the Sebastopol Municipality:
1.- Gagarin Raion
(1.- municipality of Gagarin)
2.- Raion of Lenin
(2.- Lenin municipality)
3.- Raion of Najímov
(3.- municipality of Najímov, 4.- municipality of Andréievka, 5.- municipality of Kacha, 6.- municipality of Verkhniesadovoe)
4.- Raion of Balaklava
(7.- municipality of Balaklava, 8.- municipality of Orlynoe, 9.- municipality of Ternovka, 10.- municipality of Inkerman city)

Administratively, the city of Sevastopol is the third largest federal city in Russia (after Moscow and Saint Petersburg). Sevastopol Municipality has two cities (Sevastopol and Inkerman), an urban district (Kacha) and a number of villages. Its territory is administratively divided into four raions.

Two raions are completely urban, Gagarin raion in the western part of Sevastopol and Lenin raion in the city center. Nakhimov Raion including the northern part of Sevastopol is located north of the Belbek River and includes the Kacha urban commune. Finally, the Balaklava raion, which is the largest, includes the southeastern part of Sevastopol, the city of Inkerman and a large rural area.

Prior to the 1954 transfer of Crimea from the Russian SSR to the Ukrainian SSR, Sevastopol was elevated into a "city of republican subordination" of the Russian Federation (a predecessor of today's "city of federal importance") However, in practice it was still governed as a part of the Crimean Oblast (for example, Sevastopolians elected deputies to the regional council and all its structures, such as local military departments, among others, were subordinated to provincial structures) and therefore was practically transferred as well. The 1978 Ukrainian Constitution included Sevastopol as one of its "city of republican subordination" along with Kiev, while the Russian constitution of the same year did not include Sevastopol as such. In 1993, the Russian Supreme Soviet issued a resolution, confirming the "Russian federal state of Sevastopol" and calling for a parliamentary commission to prepare and submit to the Russian Congress of People's Deputies corresponding constitutional amendments, but the Russian constitutional crisis of 1993 prevented that from happening and initial revisions of The Constitution of Russia, approved on December 12, 1993, did not include Sevastopol as a Russian federal subject. Three years later, the State Duma declared that Russia had the right to exercise sovereignty over Sevastopol, but this resolution had no real effect.

Demographics

The Russian population in Sevastopol constitutes 70% of the population and Russian is the predominant language of 97%. Sevastopol has a population of approximately 381,977. The Sevastopol metropolitan area has 961,885 inhabitants (2008). According to the 2001 National Census of Ukraine, the population of Sevastopol by ethnic group is distributed as follows: Russians (71.6%), Ukrainians (22.4%), Belarusians (1.6%), Tatars (0.7%), Crimean Tatars (0.5%), Armenians (0.3%), Jews (0.3%), Moldovans (0.2%) and Azerbaijanis (0.2%).

The structure of the population by age has changed slightly in the last 10 years: 14% of the total resident population is from 0 to 15 years old on average, 65% is from 16 to 59 years old and 21% of 60 years or more. Of the total population of Sevastopol, 172,800 (45.6%) are men and 206,500 (54.4%) are women. The average age of the population is 41 years, the fertility rate is 1.62. The average life expectancy of Sevastopol residents is 69.67 years, which is slightly higher than the national average (69.29).

Economy and transport

The city stands out for its food industries, heavy machinery development and, above all, shipbuilding. In addition, due to its hot summers, it is an important tourist destination.

Tourism

Russian dramatic theatre A. Lunacharsky in Sevastopol, built between 1954—1956

The Museum of the Heroic Defense and Liberation of Sevastopol has the picture-panorama «Defense of Sevastopol 1854-1855». The “Diorama” has the painting “Assault on Mount Sapún on May 7, 1944”. This also includes the defense of the Malakhov Tower Cemetery and the Church of Saint Volodymyr, with the pantheon of extraordinary admirals such as Lazarev, Kornilov, Najimov and Istomin.

Other sites of interest are the Confraternity Cemetery and the Inkerman Cave Monastery located in the nearby city of Inkerman.

Gallery

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  In the streets of the city

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  One of the strong

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  Stairs and floral watch.

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  Painful corner of the city

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  The terraplén

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  Eternal flame on the wall of pain

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  Entrance to the city park

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  Monument to the heroic defenders of the city

Sports

Equipment	Sport	Competition	Stadium	Creation
FC Sevastopol	Football	Premier League of Ukraine	SK Sevastopol Stadium	2002

Famous people from Sevastopol

• Arkadi Avérchenko, Russian playwright
• Ivan Papanin, Russian explorer
• Konstantin Staniukóvich, Russian writer

Twinned cities

Sevastopol is twinned with the following cities: