East Kazakhstan Province (
Kazakh:
Шығыс Қазақстан облысы,
Şığıs Qazaqstan oblısı) is a
province of
Kazakhstan. It occupies the easternmost part of Kazakhstan, along both sides of the
Irtysh River and
Lake Zaysan. Its capital is
Oskemen (also referred to as Ust-Kamenogorsk). The province borders
Russia in the north and northeast and the
People's Republic of China (
Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region) in the south and southeast. The easternmost point of the Oblast is also very near, within 50 kilometers or so of the westernmost tip of
Mongolia; however, Kazakhstan and Mongolia do not share a common border, the two countries being separated by a small part of Russia and China.
The population of the province is 1,442,000, of which 320,000 live in the capital. The area has many
Russians and
Ukrainians; the capital itself has more of those two groups than
Kazakhs themselves . The area is 283,300 in square kilometers.
The province was created by the merger of two Soviet-era Kazakhstan
oblasts: the old Vostochno-Kazakhstanskaya (East Kazakhstan) Oblast
and
Semipalatinsk Oblast.
Demographics
65% of the population is ethnic Kazakh and 30% Russian.
See also
