Russian Federation
Area: 17,075,200 sq km
land: 16,995,800 sq km
water: 79,400 sq km
Land boundaries: total: 20,096.5 km
border countries: Azerbaijan 284 km, Belarus 959 km, China (southeast) 3,605 km, China (south) 40 km, Estonia 294 km, Finland 1,340 km, Georgia 723 km, Kazakhstan 6,846 km, North Korea 19 km, Latvia 217 km, Lithuania (Kaliningrad Oblast) 280.5 km, Mongolia 3,485 km, Norway 196 km, Poland (Kaliningrad Oblast) 232 km, Ukraine 1,576 km
Coastline: 37,653 km
Climate: ranges from steppes in the south through humid continental in much of European Russia; subarctic in Siberia to tundra climate in the polar north; winters vary from cool along Black Sea coast to frigid in Siberia; summers vary from warm in the steppes to cool along Arctic coast.
Terrain: broad plain with low hills west of Urals; vast coniferous forest and tundra in Siberia; uplands and mountains along southern border regions
lowest point: Caspian Sea -28 m
highest point: Gora El'brus 5,633 m
Natural resources: oil, natural gas, coal, and many strategic minerals, timber, etc.
Population: 141,377,000 (2007)
Government type: federation
Capital: Moscow
note: Russia is divided into 11 time zones
Administrative divisions:
47 oblasts (oblastey, singular - oblast), 21 republics (respublik, singular - respublika), 6 autonomous okrugs (avtonomnykh okrugov, singular - avtonomnyy okrug), 8 krays (krayev, singular - kray), 2 federal cities (goroda, singular - gorod), and 1 autonomous oblast (avtonomnaya oblast')
oblasts: Amur (Blagoveshchensk), Arkhangel'sk, Astrakhan', Belgorod, Bryansk, Chelyabinsk, Chita, Irkutsk, Ivanovo, Kaliningrad, Kaluga, Kemerovo, Kirov, Kostroma, Kurgan, Kursk, Leningrad, Lipetsk, Magadan, Moscow, Murmansk, Nizhniy Novgorod, Novgorod, Novosibirsk, Omsk, Orenburg, Orel, Penza, Pskov, Rostov, Ryazan', Sakhalin (Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk), Samara, Saratov, Smolensk, Sverdlovsk (Yekaterinburg), Tambov, Tomsk, Tula, Tver', Tyumen', Ul'yanovsk, Vladimir, Volgograd, Vologda, Voronezh, Yaroslavl'
republics: Adygeya (Maykop), Altay (Gorno-Altaysk), Bashkortostan (Ufa), Buryatiya (Ulan-Ude), Chechnya (Groznyy), Chuvashiya (Cheboksary), Dagestan (Makhachkala), Ingushetiya (Magas), Kabardino-Balkariya (Nal'chik), Kalmykiya (Elista), Karachayevo-Cherkesiya (Cherkessk), Kareliya (Petrozavodsk), Khakasiya (Abakan), Komi (Syktyvkar), Mariy-El (Yoshkar-Ola), Mordoviya (Saransk), North Ossetia (Vladikavkaz), Sakha [Yakutiya] (Yakutsk), Tatarstan (Kazan'), Tyva (Kyzyl), Udmurtiya (Izhevsk)
autonomous okrugs: Aga Buryat (Aginskoye), Chukotka (Anadyr'), Khanty-Mansi, Nenets (Nar'yan-Mar), Ust'-Orda Buryat (Ust'-Ordynskiy), Yamalo-Nenets (Salekhard)
krays: Altay (Barnaul), Kamchatka, Khabarovsk, Krasnodar, Krasnoyarsk, Permskiy, Primorskiy (Vladivostok), Stavropol'
federal cities: Moscow (Moskva), Saint Petersburg (Sankt-Peterburg)
autonomous oblast: Yevrey [Jewish] (Birobidzhan)
Independence: 24 August 1991 (from Soviet Union)
National holiday: Russia Day, 12 June (1990)
Flag: three equal horizontal bands of white (top), blue, and red
GDP - per capita (PPP): $12,200 (2006)
Labor force: 74 million (2006)
Unemployment rate: 6.6% and a lot of underemployment (2006)
Population below poverty line: 17.8% (2004)
Exports: $317.6 billion (2006) - petroleum and petroleum products, natural gas, wood and wood products, metals, chemicals, and a wide variety of civilian and military manufactures.
Imports: $171.5 billion (2006) - machinery and equipment, consumer goods, medicines, meat, sugar, semi-finished metal products
Languages: Russian and many minority languages
Currency : Russian ruble (RUR)
Internet country code: .ru
Internet users: 23.7 million (2005)
Transportation:
Airports: 1,623 (2006)
Railways: total: 87,157 km
Roadways: total: 871,000 km
paved: 738,000 km (includes 29,000 km of expressways)
unpaved: 133,000 km
Waterways: 102,000 km
