| Russian Federation
Росси́йская Федерaция (Russian)
Rossiyskaya Federatsiya | |
|---|---|
Anthem:
"Gosudarstvenny gimn Rossiyskoy Federatsii (Slav'sya, otechestvo, nashe svobodnoye Bratskih narodov soyuz vekovoy) " (transliteration) "State Anthem of the Russian Federation" | |
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| |
| Capital and largest city | Moscow 55°45′N 37°37′E |
| Official languages | Russian |
| Recognised national languages | See Languages of Russia |
| Ethnic groups(2010[1]) | |
| Religion | See Religion in Russia |
| Demonym | Russian |
| Government | Federal semi-presidentialconstitutional republic[2] |
| Vladimir Putin | |
| Dmitry Medvedev | |
| Valentina Matviyenko | |
| Vyacheslav Volodin | |
| Legislature | Federal Assembly |
| Federation Council | |
| State Duma | |
| Formation | |
| 862 | |
| 882 | |
| 1283 | |
| 16 January 1547 | |
| 22 October 1721 | |
| 14 September 1917 | |
| 7 November 1917[note 1] | |
| 30 December 1922 | |
| 12 June 1990 | |
| 8 December 1991b | |
• Russian Federation
| 25 December 1991b |
| 12 December 1993 | |
| Area | |
• Total
| 17,098,246 km2(6,601,670 sq mi)[4](without Crimea)[note 2](1st) |
• Water (%)
| 13[6] (including swamps) |
| Population | |
• 2018 estimate
| 144,526,636  [7] (without Crimea)[note 3] (9th) |
• Density
| 8.4/km2 (21.8/sq mi) (225th) |
| GDP (PPP) | 2018 estimate |
• Total
| $4.152 trillion[8] (6th) |
• Per capita
| $28,957[8] (49th) |
| GDP (nominal) | 2018 estimate |
• Total
| $1.719 trillion[8] (12th) |
• Per capita
| $11,946[8] (67th) |
| Gini (2015) |  37.7[9]medium · 98 |
| HDI (2015) | 0.804[10] very high · 49th |
| Currency | Russian ruble (₽) (RUB) |
| Time zone | (UTC+2 to +12) |
| Date format | dd.mm.yyyy |
| Drives on the | right |
| Calling code | +7 |
| ISO 3166 code | RU |
| Internet TLD | |
| |
Russia (Russian: Росси́я, tr. Rossiya, IPA: [rɐˈsʲijə]), also officially known as the Russian Federation[12] (Russian: Росси́йская Федерaция, tr. Rossiyskaya Federatsiya, IPA: [rɐˈsʲijskəjə fʲɪdʲɪˈratsɨjə]), is a sovereign country in Eurasia.[13] At 17,125,200 square kilometres (6,612,100 sq mi),[14] Russia is the largest country in the world by area, covering more than one-eighth of the Earth's inhabited land area,[15][16][17] and the ninth most populous, with over 144 million people as of December 2017, excluding Crimea.[7] About 77% of the population live in the western, European part of the country. Russia's capital Moscow is one of the largest cities in the world; other major urban centers include Saint Petersburg, Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg and Nizhny Novgorod.
Extending across the entirety of Northern Asia and much of Eastern Europe, Russia spans eleven time zones and incorporates a wide range of environments and landforms. From northwest to southeast, Russia shares land borders with Norway, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland (both with Kaliningrad Oblast), Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, China, Mongolia and North Korea. It shares maritime borders with Japan by the Sea of Okhotsk and the U.S.state of Alaska across the Bering Strait.
The East Slavs emerged as a recognizable group in Europe between the 3rd and 8th centuries AD.[18] Founded and ruled by a Varangian warrior elite and their descendants, the medieval state of Rus arose in the 9th century. In 988 it adopted Orthodox Christianity from the Byzantine Empire,[19] beginning the synthesis of Byzantine and Slavic cultures that defined Russian culture for the next millennium.[19] Rus' ultimately disintegrated into a number of smaller states; most of the Rus' lands were overrun by the Mongol invasion and became tributaries of the nomadic Golden Horde in the 13th century.[20] The Grand Duchy of Moscowgradually reunified the surrounding Russian principalities, achieved independence from the Golden Horde. By the 18th century, the nation had greatly expanded through conquest, annexation, and exploration to become the Russian Empire, which was the third largest empire in history, stretching from Poland on the west to Alaska on the east.[21][22]
Following the Russian Revolution, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic became the largest and leading constituent of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the world's first constitutionally socialist state.[23] The Soviet Union played a decisive role in the Allied victory in World War II,[24][25] and emerged as a recognized superpower and rival to the United States during the Cold War. The Soviet era saw some of the most significant technological achievements of the 20th century, including the world's first human-made satellite and the launching of the first humans in space. By the end of 1990, the Soviet Union had the world's second largest economy, largest standing military in the world and the largest stockpile of weapons of mass destruction.[26][27][28] Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, twelve independent republics emerged from the USSR: Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and the Baltic states regained independence: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania; the Russian SFSR reconstituted itself as the Russian Federation and is recognized as the continuing legal personality and a successor of the Soviet Union.[29] It is governed as a federal semi-presidentialrepublic.
The Russian economy ranks as the twelfth largest by nominal GDP and sixth largest by purchasing power parity in 2015.[30] Russia's extensive mineral and energy resources are the largest such reserves in the world,[31] making it one of the leading producers of oil and natural gas globally.[32][33] The country is one of the five recognized nuclear weapons states and possesses the largest stockpile of weapons of mass destruction.[34] Russia is a great power as well as a regional power and has been characterised as a potential superpower. It is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, as well as a member of the G20, the Council of Europe, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), and the World Trade Organization (WTO), as well as being the leading member of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and one of the five members of the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU), along with Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.