BudjakBudjak, also known as Budzhak (Bulgarian and Ukrainian: Буджак, Bugeac, Gagauz and Turkish: Bucak), is a historical region that was part of Bessarabia from 1812 - 1940. Situated along the Black Sea, between the Danube and Dniester rivers, this multi-ethnic region covers an area of and is home to approximately 600,000 people. The majority of the region is now located in Ukraine's Odesa Oblast, while the remaining part is found in the southern districts of Moldova.
IzmailIzmail (Ізмаї́л, izmɐˈjiɫ; Ismail, Smil or Smeilu; Исмаил; formerly Tuchkov, Тучков) is a city and municipality on the Danube river in Odesa Oblast in south-western Ukraine. It serves as the administrative center of Izmail Raion, one of seven districts of Odesa Oblast, and is the only locality which constitutes Izmail urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. In Russian historiography, Izmail is associated with the 18th century sacking of Ottoman fortress of Izmail by Russian general Alexander Suvorov.
MoldovansMoldovans, sometimes referred to as Moldavians (moldoveni moldoˈvenj, Moldovan Cyrillic: молдовень), are a Romanian-speaking ethnic group and the largest ethnic group of the Republic of Moldova (75.1% of the population as of 2014) and a significant minority in Ukraine and Russia. There is an ongoing controversy, in part involving the linguisitic definition of ethnicity, over whether Moldovans' self-identification constitutes an ethnic group distinct and separate from Romanians, or a subset.
Tatarbunary UprisingThe Tatarbunary Uprising (Răscoala de la Tatarbunar) was a Bolshevik-inspired and Soviet-backed peasant revolt that took place on 15–18 September 1924, in and around the town of Tatarbunary (Tatar-Bunar or Tatarbunar) in Budjak (Bessarabia), then part of Romania, now part of Odessa Oblast, Ukraine. It was led by a pro-Soviet revolutionary committee which called for the creation of a "Moldavian Soviet Republic" and an end to "Romanian occupation".
TransnistriaTransnistria, officially the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic (PMR), is an unrecognised state internationally considered to be part of Moldova. Transnistria controls most of the narrow strip of land between the Dniester river and the Moldovan–Ukrainian border, as well as some land on the other side of the river's bank. Its capital and largest city is Tiraspol. Transnistria has been recognised only by three other unrecognised or partially recognised breakaway states: Abkhazia, Artsakh and South Ossetia.
GagauziaGagauzia or Gagauz-Yeri, officially the Autonomous Territorial Unit of Gagauzia (ATUG), is an autonomous territorial unit of Moldova. Its autonomy is ethnically motivated by the predominance in the region of the Gagauz people, who are primarily Orthodox Turkic-speaking people. At the end of World War I, all of the territory of Gagauzia became part of the Kingdom of Romania, before being carved up into the Soviet Union in June 1940. From 1941 to 1944 it was again part of Romania, after which it was incorporated into the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic.
Gagauz peopleThe Gagauz (Gagauzlar) are a Turkic ethnic group native to southern Moldova (Gagauzia, Taraclia District, Basarabeasca District) and southwestern Ukraine (Budjak). Gagauz are mostly Eastern Orthodox Christians. The term Gagauz is also often used as a collective naming of Turkic people living in the Balkans, speaking the Gagauz language, a language separated from Balkan Gagauz Turkish. Gagauz is the most widely accepted singular and plural form of the name, and some references use Gagauzy (from Ukrainian) or Gagauzi.
OdesaOdesa (also spelled Odessa) is the third most populous city and municipality in Ukraine and a major seaport and transport hub located in the south-west of the country, on the northwestern shore of the Black Sea. The city is also the administrative centre of the Odesa Raion and Odesa Oblast, as well as a multiethnic cultural centre. As of January 2021, Odesa's population was approximately On 25 January 2023, its historic city centre was declared a World Heritage Site and added to the List of World Heritage in Danger by the UNESCO World Heritage Committee in recognition of its influence on cinema, literature, and the arts.
BessarabiaBessarabia (ˌbɛsəˈreɪbiə; Besarabiya; Basarabia; Bessarabiia) is a historical region in Eastern Europe, bounded by the Dniester river on the east and the Prut river on the west. About two thirds of Bessarabia lies within modern-day Moldova, with the Ukrainian Budjak region covering the southern coastal region and part of the Ukrainian Chernivtsi Oblast covering a small area in the north.
DniesterThe Dniester (ˈniːstər ) is a transboundary river in Eastern Europe. It runs first through Ukraine and then through Moldova (from which it more or less separates the breakaway territory of Transnistria), finally discharging into the Black Sea on Ukrainian territory again. The name Dniester derives from Sarmatian dānu nazdya "the close river." (The Dnieper, also of Sarmatian origin, derives from the opposite meaning, "the river on the far side".
