Krasnodon Raion
History
It was originally formed in 1923 as Sorokyne Raion. It was subordinate to Shakhty Okruha of Donets Governorate of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. On August 12, 1927, it received the status of a national raion for ethnic Russians. At the time, it had a population of 13,216 people, of whom 80.5% were ethnic Russians. In 1930, it was assigned to Luhansk Okruha. From September 1930 to 1932, it was subordinated directly to the republic. In 1932, it was assigned to Donetsk Oblast. By this time, it was still considered a national raion. In June 1938, it was transferred to Voroshylovhrad Oblast (later renamed Luhansk Oblast). At some point, it was renamed Krasnodon Raion.
Since 2014, Krasnodon Raion has been controlled by forces of the Luhansk People's Republic (LPR). Initially, Krasnodon was incorporated as a city of oblast significance and did not belong to the raion, but in 2015, Ukraine officially merged it into the raion. In 2016, the Verkhovna Rada renamed Krasnodon Raion to Sorokyne Raion, implementing the law prohibiting names of Communist origin.
Sorokyne Raion was abolished by Ukraine on 18 July 2020 as part of the administrative reform of Ukraine, which reduced the number of raions of Luhansk Oblast to eight. The LPR continued using the raion - under the name "Krasnodon Raion" - as an administrative unit after that point, and following the 2022 annexation referendums in Russian-occupied Ukraine, Russia has done the same.
Demographics
As of the Ukrainian Census of 2001:
- Ethnicity
- Russian: 51.7%
- Ukrainian: 45.9%
- Belarusians: 0.9%
- Language
- Russian 68.8%
- Ukrainian 30.0%
- Armenian 0.1%
- Belarusian 0.1%