Krasnodon

Krasnodon Краснодон
City of regional significance
Krasnodon skyline Krasnodon skyline
Flag of Krasnodon Flag Coat of arms of Krasnodon Coat of arms
Krasnodon Location of Krasnodon
Coordinates:
Country Oblast	Ukraine Luhansk Oblast
Founded	1914 as Sorokino
Renamed	1938 as Krasnodon
Government
• Mayor	Yuri Borisovich Baklagov
Area
• Total	77.33 km2 (29.86 sq mi)
Population (2013)
• Total	44,283
Postal code	94400
Area code(s)	+380 6435
Website	http://krasnodon.org.ua/

Krasnodon (Ukrainian, Russian: Краснодон) is a city in Luhansk Oblast (region) of eastern Ukraine. It is incorporated as a city of oblast significance and serves as the administrative center of Krasnodon Raion (district), though it does not belong to the raion. Population: 44,283 (2013 est.).

Population of Krasnodon in 1972 was 70,400, in 1989 it was around 53,000, in 2001 it was 49,921.

History

Krasnodon was established in 1914 along the banks of the Velyka Kamyanka, a tributary of the Seversky Donets River, as the settlement of Sorokino. It soon became one of the centers of the coal mining industry of the Donbass region. By the Decision of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, on 28 October 1938 it was renamed to Krasnodon.

During the German-Soviet War, Krasnodon was occupied by Nazi Germany from July 20, 1942 to February 14, 1943. The anti-Nazi Komsomol organization Young Guard operated in the city from October 1942 to January 1943, when most of its members were arrested and executed. The Young Guard are commemorated with monuments and a memorial complex in Krasnodon.

Since 2014, Krasnodon has been controlled by the Luhansk People's Republic and not by Ukrainian authorities. NATO released inconclusive satellite data from 21 August 2014, appearing to show a large column of armoured vehicles crossing into Ukraine from Russia through Krasnodon. The images, unverified by date or location, identified Russian made vehicles which could belong to the Ukrainian army, could already have been on the territory of Ukraine before the conflict began, or could have been captured from the Kiev forces by the people's militias.

Demographics

Native language as of the Ukrainian Census of 2001:

• Russian 90.75%
• Ukrainian 8.46%
• Romani 0.17%
• Armenian 0.15%
• Belarusian 0.12%

Gallery

• Bolshaya Kamenka.jpg

  Bolshaya Kamenka River in Krasnodon

• Grieving mother.jpg

  Grieving mother monument

• Krasnodoncoal.jpg

  Krasnodon Coal Company

• Krasnodon-ZiU-9-032-01.jpg

  A trolleybus in Krasnodon

See also

• Oleg Koshevoy
• Ivan Turkenich

External links

• (Russian) Official city page
• (Russian) Krasnodon - our city