The changing face of Russia and geography.
River, northeastern Siberia, eastern Russia. Rising in the Kolyma Mountains and emptying in the East Siberian Sea, it is 1,323 mi (2,129 km) long. It is navigable upstream to Verkhne-Kolymsk but is ice-free only from June to September. Under Joseph Stalin the goldfields of the upper Kolyma River valley held labour camps where more than one million prisoners died (193254).
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