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Russia sold Alaska to the United States in 1867. Part of what is now Poland was in Russia until 1918. The Crimean peninsula was in Russia until 1954 when it was transferred to the Ukraine.

Has Russia lost any land since 1954 that is not inside its current borders?

By Russia I mean the formal state of Russia, whether Tsarist or a republic or a federation. For the avoidance of doubt, I do not mean the USSR. By Russia "having" territory, I mean land formally being administered as part of Russia. So this does not include Berlin, for example.

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  • Are you interested in territories of Russian Federation or Russian Empire or the USSR?
    – Anixx
    Aug 20, 2022 at 20:51
  • Also, are you interested in sea areas as well?
    – Anixx
    Aug 20, 2022 at 20:55
  • Also, do you count contested land that had no definite jurisdiction before?
    – Anixx
    Aug 20, 2022 at 20:57
  • 2
    The question in the title is quite different from the question in the body.
    – MCW
    Aug 20, 2022 at 22:44
  • political. 30 year rule Aug 21, 2022 at 11:32

1 Answer 1

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There is wide criticism that president Medvedev in 2010 has gifted wide areas, equal to two Moscow oblasts to Norway.

https://realtribune.ru/news-authority-5056

https://www.sknews.ru/rubriki/main/76623-za-chto-medvedev-podaril-norvegii-80-tysach-km-rossijskoj-territorii.html

But you may be would not count it, because the areas were a) marine (e.g., no dry surface), b) contested.

There was also criticism that in 2004 Putin gifted to China the contested islands on Amur river: https://lenta.ru/news/2004/10/20/islands/

https://lenta.ru/articles/2004/10/20/island/

https://sakhalin.info/news/25947

Also, in 1991 Gorbachev gave China about 600 contested islands, including the island Damansky for which there was a border war between the USSR and China in the 1960s. Some of that gifted territory was in Russian Federation, but other in other republics.

https://www.gazeta.ru/science/2021/05/18_a_13597898.shtml

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  • Many thanks. So since 1950 Russian land losses appear to be Crimea (ceded to Ukraine in 1954, regained 2014), and some islands near the border with China (ceded to China in 1991 and 2004),
    – user46904
    Aug 21, 2022 at 12:33

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