UA-1022803, UA-1102284, SW CB-184 Ukraine Україна

UA-1102284

Swap-bot SW CB-184

Ukraine Україна is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km2 (233,062 sq mi), making it the largest country entirely within Europe

Ukraine has long been a global breadbasket because of its extensive, fertile farmlands. It is consistently one of the world's top three grain exporters and Ukrainian agricultural land is an attractive acquisition asset for investors. Additionally, the country has a well-developed manufacturing sector, particularly in aerospace and industrial equipment.

The capital and largest city is Kiev. Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Ukraine continues to maintain the second-largest military in Europe, after that of Russia. The country is home to 45.4 million people (including Crimea), 77.8% of whom are Ukrainians by ethnicity, and with a sizable minority of Russians (17%) as well as Romanians/Moldavians, Belarusians, Tatars, and Hungarians. Ukrainian is the official language of Ukraine; its alphabet is Cyrillic. Russian is also still widely spoken. The dominant religion in the country is Eastern Orthodox Christianity, which has strongly influenced Ukrainian architecture, literature and music.

Administratively, Ukraine is subdivided into twenty-four oblasts (regions) and one autonomous republic, Crimea. Additionally, the cities of Kiev and Sevastopol, both have a special legal status. The 24 oblasts and Crimea are subdivided into 490 raions (districts), or second-level administrative units.

Flag of Ukraine - Blue & Yellow

Following the 2014 Crimean crisis, Crimea and Sevastopol became de facto administrated by the Russian Federation which claims them as the Republic of Crimea and the federal city of Sevastopol. Internationally they are still recognised as parts of Ukraine.

I received these 3 postcards from (1) Veronika (25 July 2014) Postcrossing (2) Katya (21 July 2014) Swap-bot and (3) Ludmila (23 April 2014) Postcrossing.