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Krasnodar, formerly Yekaterinodar (until 1920), is the largest city and the administrative centre of Krasnodar Krai, Russia. The city stands on the Kuban River in southern Russia, with a population of 930,629 residents, and up to 1 million residents in the urban agglomeration. Krasnodar is the sixteenth-largest city in Russia, and the second-largest city in southern Russia, as well as the Southern Federal District. The city originated in 1793 as a fortress built by the Cossacks, and became a trading center for southern Russia. The city sustained heavy damage in World War II but was rebuilt and renovated after the war. Krasnodar is a major economic hub in southern Russia; In 2012, Forbes named Krasnodar the best city for business in Russia. Krasnodar is home to numerous sights, including the Krasnodar Stadium. Its main airport is Krasnodar International Airport. [edit] History
The city originated in 1793 as a military camp, then as a fortress built by the Cossacks to defend imperial borders and to assert Russian dominion over Circassia, a claim which Ottoman Turkey contested. In the first half of the 19th century, Yekaterinodar grew into a busy center of the Kuban Cossacks, gaining official town status in 1867. By 1888 about 45,000 people lived in the city, which had become a vital trade center for southern Russia. In 1897 an obelisk commemorating the two-hundred-year history of the Kuban Cossacks (seen as founded in 1696) was erected in Yekaterinodar. The city was the administrative center of the Yekaterinodarsky Otdel of the Kuban Oblast. During the Russian Civil War (1917-1922) the city changed hands several times, coming successively under the control of the Red Army and of the Volunteer Army. Many Kuban Cossacks, as committed anti-Bolsheviks, supported the White Movement. Lavr Kornilov, a White general, captured the city on April 10, 1918, only to be killed a week later when a Bolshevik artillery shell blew up the farmhouse where he had set up his headquarters. During the Soviet famine of 1932–1933 Krasnodar lost over 14% of its population. During World War II units of the German Army occupied Krasnodar between August 9, 1942, and February 12, 1943. The city sustained heavy damage in the fighting but was rebuilt and renovated after the war. German forces, including Gestapo and "mobile SS execution squads", killed thousands of Jews, Communists, and "supposed Communist 'partisans.'" Shooting, hanging, burning, and even gas vans were used. In the summer of 1943, the Soviets began trials, including of their own citizens, for collusion with the Nazis and for participation in war crimes. The first such trial took place at Krasnodar from July 14 to 17, 1943. The Krasnodar tribunal pronounced eight death sentences, which were summarily carried out in the city square in front of a crowd of about thirty thousand people. On June 14, 1971, a bombing occurred on a bus in the city, when a homemade suitcase bomb placed near the gas tank by a mentally ill Peter Volynsky exploded. The bomb killed 10 persons and wounded 20–90 others. [edit] Research Tips
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