Kremenchuk

Kremenchuk is an city in central Ukraine which stands on the banks of the Dnieper River. The city serves as the administrative center of Kremenchuk Raion and Kremenchuk urban hromada within Poltava Oblast. Its population is approximately 215,271 (2022 estimate), making it the second-largest city in Poltava Oblast and the 31st largest city in Ukraine. In 2001, the Ukrainian government included the city in the list of historical settlements.

Kremenchuk is believed to have been founded in 1571, when a fortress was nominally established in the city after the signing of the Union of Lublin. Despite this, the area remained depopulated for decades afterward until 1635, when French engineer Guillaume Le Vasseur de Beauplan actually built a small fortress for Kremenchuk, which was the year the city was granted Magdeburg law rights. The city was then seized by the Cossack Hetmanate in the Khmelnytsky Uprising, before finally being burned down in a siege as part of the Polish–Russian War (1654–1667) in 1663. Kremenchuk was then revived by the Russian Empire following the Treaty of Andrusovo under the name of Kremenchug, when it became the capital of the Novorossiya Governorate for a short time, before being demoted again. During this time, the fortress fell into decay, and the city shifted towards being of industrial importance on the Dnieper. After the Russian Civil War, the city was claimed by the Ukrainian SSR in 1919, and in 1922 the city was annexed into the Soviet Union, initially as the capital of the short-lived Kremenchuk Governorate. The city was then affected by World War II, which saw the massacre of its sizable Jewish population - 22% before the war - as part of the Holocaust and the killing of tens of thousands in prisoner of war camps before being liberated during the Battle of the Dnieper. After it recovered, the city became an industrial powerhouse due to the opening of KrAZ and the Kremenchuk Oil Refinery. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the city became part of a newly independent Ukraine.

Kremenchuk remains heavily industrialised, with some of its largest enterprises being KrAZ, Kryukiv Railway Car Building Works, and the Kremenchuk Oil Refinery, although the latter was destroyed in 2022. Cultural landmarks include Peace Park and the Stone Tower, which was built in the late 1700s. The city has multiple museums, including the Kremenchuk Museum of Local Lore, the All-Ukrainian Museum of the History of Uniforms, and the Museum of the History of Aviation, among others. The city is home to the association football team FC Kremin Kremenchuk, which play their home games at Kremin-Arena, and the ice hockey club HC Kremenchuk, which plays at Aisberg Arena. The city is also home to multiple institutions of higher education, most notably Kremenchuk National University.