Czech Republic

Czech Republic (Ceská republika; Ukr: Чеська Республіка; Cheska Respublika). A republic in Central Europe, bordering on Poland to the north, Austria to the south, Germany to the west, and Slovakia to the east. It emerged on 1 January 1993 as a result of a peaceful dissolution of Czechoslovakia and its division into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The Czech Republic includes the historical territories of Bohemia, Moravia, and Czech Silesia. It covers an area of has an area of 78,860 sq km and has a population of 10,538,275 (2014), of whom nearly 95% percent are Czechs and Moravians, 1.4% Slovaks, and close to 3% other nationalities. Official figures (2010) indicate that 126,521 Ukrainians live in the Czech Republic, although the actual number is probably higher. The capital is Prague (2011 pop 1,262,106). (For the history of Ukrainians in the Czech lands and of Ukrainian-Czech relations, see Bohemia.)

As a result of a considerable influx of Ukrainian immigrants in the 2000s, several Ukrainian cultural and community organizations were established in the Czech Republic. Ukrainians are organized in the Ukrainian Initiative in the Czech Republic, the Berehynia Association of Ukrainian Work Migrants in the Czech Republic, Association of Ukrainians and Friends of Ukraine, the Union of Ukrainian Women in the Czech Republic, and others. Most of these Ukrainian organizations are concentrated in Prague; other smaller centres of the Ukrainian community life include Chomutov, Plzeň, Brno.

[This article was updated in 2015.]