Loading
  • 21 Aug, 2019

  • By, Wikipedia

Torez

Chystiakove (Ukrainian: Чистякове IPA: [t͡ʃɪsʲtʲɐˈkɔwe] , Russian: Чистяково), formerly Torez (Ukrainian: Торез, Russian: Торез) until 2016, is a city in Donetsk Oblast, in eastern Ukraine. The city is a center of the regional coal industry and much of its economy relies on mining, despite a recent drop in the number of employed miners. The city has a population of 53,462 (2022 estimate).

Founded in 1778, the city was named Chystiakove in 1868. It was renamed Torez in 1964 in honor of Maurice Thorez, a leader of the French Communist Party. In 2016, the Ukrainian parliament restored the name Chystiakove due to decommunization laws.

Pro-Russian separatists took control of Chystiakove in June 2014.

History

The region was settled in 1778 at the confluence of the Sevostyanivka and Orlova Rivers (which drain into the Mius River) by runaway serfs from southern Russia and Ukraine. By 1800 the settlement, with 225 residents, was known as the sloboda Oleksiivka after a son of landowner and founder S. Leonov. From 1840 it was named Oleksiieve-Leonove, and from 1868 Chystiakove.

By the 1860s the town, now known as Chystiakove for a merchant and owner of a local manor, was a coal-mining hub. In 1875, two mining companies were founded: Chystiakovs'ke (which operated two coal mines) and Oleksiivs'ke, which was renamed Nadiya in 1907. The mines produced 4.7 million pounds of coal in 1909, and 76.8 million pounds by 1916.

In 1924 the Chystiakove mining industry had 142 settlements, with a total of 44,679 residents. Eight years later the settlements became a town, and the town's ten coal-mining quarries were incorporated into the Chystyakovugol Industrial Trust a year after that.

During the 1940s, the town had three administrative districts:

  • Chervona Zirka (Red Star)
  • Pivdenna Grupa (Southern Group)
  • Chystiakove Station (Railway)

During World War II, Chystiakove was occupied by the German Army from 31 October 1941 to 2 September 1943. In 1942, the Germans operated the Stalag 385 prisoner-of-war camp in the town, which was then relocated to Nikopol.

In 1964 Chystiakove was renamed Torez in honor of Maurice Thorez, the longtime leader of the French Communist Party who purported in his autobiography to have been a coal miner.

In 2012, the city's population was 81,761, down from a 1970 peak of about 120,000.

War-damaged building in 2015

In mid-April 2014 pro-Russian separatists captured several towns in Donetsk Oblast, including Chystiakove in June 2014. On 23 May 2014, a pro-Ukrainian militia endorsed by Oleh Lyashko killed a pro-Russian separatist and left another badly wounded amidst the separatists' takeover of the city hall.

On 17 July, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, en route to Kuala Lumpur from Amsterdam, was hit by a Russian Buk surface-to-air missile launched from separatist-controlled territory. The plane crashed near Chystiakove and all 298 people aboard were killed.

Demographics

As of the 2001 Ukrainian census:

Ethnicity
  • Ukrainians: 50.8%
  • Russians: 45.1%
  • Belarusians: 1.3%
  • Tatars: 1.3%
  • Armenians: 0.2%
  • Greeks: 0.1%
Native language
  • Russian: 81.83%
  • Ukrainian: 17.03%
  • Belarusian: 0.18%
  • Armenian: 0.11%
  • Moldovan: 0.03%
  • Bulgarian: 0.01%
  • Greek: 0.01%

Transportation

Bird's-eye view of streets and low buildings
Mykolaiv and Pioneerska Streets in central Chystiakove

Chystiakove's transport system consists of thirty-one routes served by buses and taxis and links to the cities of Snizhne and Shakhtarsk. The Luhansk-Donetsk Highway runs for nine kilometers through the center of the city. The bus station (vulytsia Popovycha) provides service to Donetsk, Kharkiv and other cities in eastern Ukraine. The city has three major railway stations: Torez (vulytsia Vokzalna), Rozsypne and Pelahiyivka. Two stations serve electric commuter trains: Dronove in Pelahiyivka and Voskresenska in central Chystiakove.

Economy

Outdoor monument to miners
Donbas mining monument

Chystiakove's major company is the state-owned Torez Anthracite, which specializes in coal mining. The company controls a number of mines and production facilities, including the Progress Mine, the Lutugin and Volhynian Mine Administrations and the Chystiakove factory. Other employers include the Chystiakove electrical and alloy factories, the Vuhleresurs Company's Terra mine, the State Penal Department and the Chystiakove food-testing factory.

Neighborhoods

Mine in the distance, behind apartment buildings and green space
Progress coal mine

Chystiakove's center includes Pionerska, Nikolaeva, Engels, Syzrantsev and 50 Years of the USSR Streets, Gagarin Avenue and Boulevard Illich. Neighborhoods are numbered one through four (Engels Street), 30th Anniversary of Victory, G and Red Star (Chervona Zirka).

Central Village (Ukrainian: Cелище центральне in southeastern Chystiakove was one of the first settlements in Chystiakove, which became a city in 1932. It has an acting school and two kindergartens.

Shanghai, a small residential area also in southeastern Chystiakove, was built in 1946 by Hungarian prisoners of war and consists of seven-story apartment buildings. In addition to Chystiakove, its city council governs two towns: Pelahiyivka and Rozsypne.

References

  1. ^ Чисельність наявного населення України на 1 січня 2022 [Number of Present Population of Ukraine, as of January 1, 2022] (PDF) (in Ukrainian and English). Kyiv: State Statistics Service of Ukraine. Archived (PDF) from the original on 4 July 2022.
  2. ^ "Рада перейменувала населені пункти на окупованому Донбасі: Торез - на Чистякове, Краснодон - на Сорокине". Unian.ua. Retrieved 16 December 2021.
  3. ^ Letters From Donbas, Radio Free Europe (11 December 2014)
  4. ^ Megargee, Geoffrey P.; Overmans, Rüdiger; Vogt, Wolfgang (2022). The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos 1933–1945. Volume IV. Indiana University Press, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. p. 383. ISBN 978-0-253-06089-1.
  5. ^ Ragozin, Leonid. "Putin Is Accidentally Helping Unite Eastern and Western Ukraine". The New Republic. Retrieved 9 February 2015.
  6. ^ "Donbass defenders put WWII tank back into service". TASS. Retrieved 9 February 2015.
  7. ^ "Specter of violence in eastern Ukraine keeps voters from polls". Kyiv Post. 24 May 2014. Retrieved 9 February 2015.
  8. ^ Crash of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 Hrabove, Ukraine, 17 July 2014 (PDF) (Report). Dutch Safety Board. 13 October 2015. Archived (PDF) from the original on 13 October 2015.
  9. ^ Weaver, Matthew (13 October 2015). "MH17 crash report: Dutch investigators confirm Buk missile hit plane". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 October 2015.
  10. ^ "MH17 Malaysia plane crash: What we know". BBC News. 14 October 2015. Retrieved 30 November 2015.
  11. ^ Національний склад та рідна мова населення Донецької області. Розподіл постійного населення за найбільш численними національностями та рідною мовою по міськрадах та районах (in Ukrainian), archived from the original on 2012-02-07
  12. ^ "Таблиця: 19A050501_02_014. Розподіл населення за рідною мовою, Донецька область (1,2,3,4)". Archived from the original on 2022-01-15. Retrieved 2022-01-15.