UKRAINE Country speaking; Укpaïнa, Russia; Укpaинa is a country in Tomut Europe which borders Russia to the east and northeast; Belarus in the northwest; Poland and Slovakia in the west; Hungary, Romania and Moldovo, in the southwest; the Black Sea in the south; and Sea of Azoc in the southeast.
At that time, Ukraine and Russia both contested the Crimean Peninsula which was annexed by Russia in 2014, even though Ukraine and many international communities recognize it as part of Ukraine.
Together with Crimea, Ukraine has an area of 603,628 km², which makes it the largest country in Europe and the 46th largest in the world. Meanwhile, a population of 44.5 million people makes Ukraine the 32nd most populous country in the world.
The territory of modern Ukraine has been inhabited since 32,000 BC. In the Middle Ages, this region was the most important center for East Slavic culture, with the strong state of Kievan Rus’ forming the basis of Ukrainian national identity.
After its split in the 13th century, the territory was contested, controlled and divided by several powers, such as Lithuania, Poland, the Ottoman Empire, Austria-Hungary and Russia. A kazaki republic emerged and prospered in the 17th and 18th centuries, but its territory was divided between Poland and the Russian Empire, which then fully belonged to Russia.
Two brief periods of independence occurred in the 20th century, the first towards the end of World War I and the second during World War II, but these two periods culminated in the conquest and annexation of the Ukrainian territories into a Soviet republic, situations which in effect until 1991, when Ukraine gained independence from the Soviet Union, soon after its dissolution at the end of the Cold War.
