Magadan

Naval base and port serving the important gold fields in eastern Siberian Russia, located near the northern shore of the Sea of Okhotsk; population (2002) 182,700. Magadan is capital of an Oblast (region) of the same name. Industries include ship repair and the manufacture of mining equipment.

Magadan was founded in 1932, when political prisoners of the Stalin era were shipped to the Far East to act as slave labour for the gold fields newly discovered in the region around the Upper Kolyma River. Thousands died in the construction of the town, and millions more in the Kolyma mine workings.

Magadan

Oblast (region) in the Russian Far East; area 1,199,100 sq km/462,973 sq mi; population (1996) 258,000 (90% urban). The capital is Magadan, and Anadyr is another city. The region extends from the Sea of Okhotsk to the Bering Strait. It is largely mountainous, with coniferous forests in the southwest and tundra in the northeast, and has an extensive permafrost layer. The principal river is the Kolyma. There are rich deposits of gold, tin, and rare metals. Industries include gold and tin mining, fishing, and reindeer breeding; food and consumer goods are almost all imported.

From the 1930s to the mid-1950s Magadan was one of the most notorious areas of forced labour camps in the former Soviet Union. The oblast was created in 1953.