Key historical facts about Ukraine’s occupied territories

August 27, 2024
The history of temporarily occupied Crimea, Donetsk, and Mariupol reveals a rich blend of culture and resistance to foreign dominance.
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Crimea

Crimea is one of the regions with the longest history. Nomadic peoples such as Cimmerians, Scythians, Sarmatians, Huns, Khazars, Pechenegs, Polovtsians, and others have lived on the Crimean steppes (along with the majority of southern Ukraine). Panticapaeum, the first Hellenic city (and the oldest still existing in Eastern Europe), was founded in 610 BC. It is now known as Kerch.

Following the fall of the Roman Empire in the sixth century, Byzantium gained influence in Crimea. The Byzantine Emperor Justinian I fortified the Greek south settlement of Chersonese to protect it from nomadic steppe people.

In the mid-15th century, the Crimean Khanate, a Crimean Tatar state, was established. Subsequently, in the first half of the 16th century, many elements of Crimean Tatar state life permeated the lives of the Tatars' neighbours, the Cossacks. For instance, Turkic words were used in the latter's military affairs. Among the words are: osavul, mace, bunchuk, maidan, and more.

The condition in Ukrainian territories that were once part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth deteriorated in the mid-sixteenth century as the Polish gentry and the Catholic Church increasingly oppressed the Ukrainian population on social, national, and spiritual levels. Simultaneously, tensions rose between the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Crimean Khanate. As a result, a brief alliance was formed between Zaporizhzhia and Crimea.

Later, in 1768, Crimea became the site of hostilities between the Russian and Ottoman empires. The war resulted in the Kyuchuk-Kainarjia Peace Treaty, which granted the Crimean Khanate independence from the Ottoman Empire but was later annexed by the Russian Empire in April 1783.

Crimea was occupied by the Germans from 1941 to 1944. Following the Nazis' expulsion, Moscow falsely accused the entire Crimean Tatar people of collaboration with the Nazis, and more than 200,000 people were deported beginning on May 18, 1944. This deportation amounted to genocide, with 20-25% of Crimean Tatars dying during the first few years of exile.

Instead of deporting indigenous people, Soviet authorities began heavily resettling loyalists, predominantly from Russia, with the goal of changing the peninsula's ethnic structure. Not only was the structure altered, but so was the memory; more than 80% of the indigenous Crimean Tatar place names were replaced with Russian-Soviet new names.

The year 1954 was also significant in Crimea's history, as it became an administrative part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR). Russia was unable to ensure normal economic provision for the peninsula, and nearly all supplies came from Ukraine.

The USSR leadership explained its decision as 'taking into account the common economy, territorial proximity, and close economic and cultural ties between the Crimean region and the Ukrainian SSR'. To address infrastructure issues, the North Crimean Canal was opened in the 1960s.

It had the potential to meet up to 85% of the peninsula's freshwater requirements from mainland Ukraine.

After gaining independence in 1991, Ukraine faced continued Russian aggression. The attempted seizure of Tuzla Island is now widely regarded as a Russian rehearsal for the events of 2014. This small island is located in the Kerch Strait, which separates Crimea and Russia's Taman Peninsula.

The Russians began building a dam on the Ukrainian island to connect it to the Russian shore. As a result, pro-Russian Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych (who later fled Ukraine following the Revolution of Dignity) and then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev agreed to extend the Russian Black Sea Fleet's stay in Sevastopol until 2042.

On February 20, 2014, Russia began to occupy Crimea. The aggressor country brought to the peninsula the disappearance of Ukrainian activists, intimidation of locals and their use as human shields during the seizure of key institutions, and the holding of a pseudo-referendum.

The occupation of Crimea has actually served as a litmus test for the Kremlin, allowing it to see how the world would react to its imperial ambitions.

Donetsk

Archaeological finds from Donetsk include pre-Scythian mounds, jewellery, pottery, and a flint knife. During the XV-XVIII centuries, the territory of modern Donetsk was home to Cossack settlements as well as various religious groups such as Mennonites (representatives of the Christian Protestant movement), among others.

Donetsk's identity was greatly shaped by Ukrainian peasants and Cossacks who moved here from Ukraine's southeastern territories to escape the Russian Empire's oppression.

The city's rapid growth was driven by coal and iron ore deposits. In 1869, British engineer John Hughes built a large steel plant, which helped to develop the surrounding infrastructure and eventually led to the establishment of Yuzivka, from which the city of Donetsk grew.

The promising city attracted Europeans to work and live in the Oblast until the Bolsheviks confiscated their industrial facilities in the early 1920s, bolstering the myth of Stalinist industrialisation.

However, due to inefficiencies in the Soviet economic system, the coal industry began to decline in the 1970s and 1980s. With mines operating on subsidies or being closed, miners staged mass protests, which served as the first impetus for Ukraine's independence.

In 1970, UNESCO designated Donetsk as the most green industrial city, and it was dubbed the City of a Million Roses. However, during the Russian occupation, the city declined due to mass repression and torture of activists, not to mention the imposition of the "Russian world," converting Ukrainian territory into a military base.

One of the brightest manifestations of Donetsk's cultural life was the art space 'Izolyatsia'. In 2010, the abandoned insulation materials factory was converted into the international charity foundation 'Izolyatsia'. When the Russians occupied Donetsk in April 2014, Izolyatsia was turned into a torture chamber for political dissidents.

Mariupol

Mariupol originated with the founding of the Ukrainian Cossack settlement of Kalmius on the right bank of the Kalmius River near its confluence with the Sea of Azov in the 1746s. The Kalmius Palanka of the Zaporozhian Lowland Cossacks became the northern Pryazovia region's settlement centre.

After the imperial government forcibly removed Greek, Armenian, Georgian, and Wallachian settlements from Crimea in 1778, they resettled to Mariupol, shaping the region's multiculturalism.

Mariupol began engaging in international trade at the turn of the nineteenth century, which aided in the development of its infrastructure. In the nineteenth century, a city garden was built, streets and squares were paved with cobblestone, and kerosene lanterns were installed for night lighting.

And thanks to global industrialisation, metallurgical plants are everywhere in the city. The first ones were constructed by Belgians and Americans. In 1897, the Russian Providence and Nikopol-Mariupol Mining and Metallurgical Society plants were founded.

The former was built by Belgians and the latter by Americans, so the plants were built in a high-tech manner. Mariupol has since become southern Ukraine's metallurgical centre. However, in 1917, the Bolsheviks seized Mariupol, combining the two plants into one named after Ilyich (referring to the Russian Bolshevik Revolution's leader Vladimir Lenin).

Mariupol, a city in Ukraine, became well-known in the spring of 2022. During Russia's full-scale war against Ukraine, which began on February 24, 2022, the Russian army employed the so-called scorched earth strategy against the city, destroying every building quarter by quarter. This is how the world learned about Mariupol, a bombed-out, mutilated, and practically, now, extinct city.

The history of Ukraine's temporarily occupied territories reveals a rich tapestry of cultural diversity, resilience, and repeated battles against foreign dominance.

Crimea, with its ancient roots and strategic significance, has been invaded numerous times, most recently by Russia in 2014, ushering in a new era of oppression and forced identity shifts.

Donetsk, once a thriving industrial and cultural hub, has also experienced occupation and cultural erasure under Russian control since 2014, leading to the suppression of its vibrant local life.

Mariupol, a historically important centre of trade and industry, has become a symbol of devastation in the aftermath of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, representing the relentless destruction inflicted on Ukraine's eastern regions. The experiences of these territories highlight how imperial ambitions continue to shape Ukraine's historical and cultural landscape.

Daria Synhaievska
Analyst and Journalist at UkraineWorld