Sakhaline ( Russian Сахалин in , Karafuto - 樺太 - in Japanese) is a Russian island located in the North-West of the Pacific Ocean, with broad of the Siberia.

The island is also a oblast (an area), the Oblast de Sakhaline. Its capital, Ioujno-Sakhalinsk (Russian Южно-Сахалинск, Toyohara - 豊原 - in Japanese), account 673.000 inhabitants. It is served by SAT Airlines since Ioujno S.

History

Sakhaline is inhabited since the Neolithic . In 1905, at the end of the War Russo-Japanese woman, the two countries signed with the the United States the Traité of Portsmouth. By this agreement, the part of Sakhaline located at the south of 50° parallel north returned to Japan, while north belonged to Russia.

Anchored vis-a-vis the Pacific Ocean, to 9  000 kilometers of Moscow, the strategic island of Sakhaline, coveted a long time by the Russians and the Japanese, was annexed in 1945 by Stalin and was attached to the the USSR. Its Siberian climate forever discouraged the pioneers who mixed with the population with the Indians autochtones. Today, whereas implosé the Soviet empire, the island leaves its insulation to engage, strong of unexploited resources, in the capitalist adventure. While lorgnant towards its neighbors: the South Korea and especially the Japan.

Economy

Sakhaline is potentially rich.

Admittedly, the island can hardly count on its agriculture: the too short summers do not allow the majority fruits, vegetables or cereals to reach their maturity. Only are cultivated rustic products: potatoes, cabbages and carrots, whose harvests are blocked by the lack of labor. Rigorous, the climate of Sakhaline is hardly favourable with agriculture. The island supplies in Central Asia, receiving by plane vegetables and fruits.

But the sea delivers its treasures to abundance: tunas, crabs and salmons whose caviar eggs make the treat of the Japanese. The island can also miser on important natural resources out of hydrocarbons, oil and gas. The Northern extrème, around Okha, produces already more than 2 million tons of black gold per annum that an underwater pipeline dispatches directly on the continent. The reserves Offshore oil rig, finally, would be evaluated to 50 million tons of oil and to 140 billion m ³ of gas.

Demography

The ethnic variety characterizes the population of Sakhaline, strong of more than 700  000 inhabitants. Russians and autochtones cohabit and sometimes marry between them. There exists also a Korean community whose first immigration dates from the beginning of the XXe century. The Korean community accounts for 7% of the population.

Climate

By its latitude, near to that of the north of France, the island should profit from a moderate climate. However the cold currents of the penetrating Pacific in the Mer of Okhotsk make there freeze water in winter. The strait which separates the island from the continent (it measures 7 km in its narrowest part) is then taken by the ice and thus opens a road " terrestre" used many times in the history. The temperatures go down in winter until -35°C; with the autumn, typhoons carrying snowstorms frequently paralyze the sea and air traffic there; and, in summer, the sky takes care of thick fogs.

Topicality

In February 2007, of the Russian fishermen were helped by helicopters and ships on drift ice which had abruptly been detached from the island.

Literature

the island of Sakhaline is a work of Anton Tchekhov

Internal bonds

• Islands Kouriles
• Treated of Shimoda
• Treated of Saint-Pétersbourg

External bonds

• Ski in Sakhalin

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