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Kars Province

Kars is a province (Turkish: il) of Turkey, located in the northeastern part of the country. It shares part of its border with the Republic of Armenia. From 1878 until 1917 all of the present-day province of Kars was part of the Russian oblast of Kars. From 1918 to 1920 the province was under the administration of the Democratic Republic of Armenia as the Vanand province (with the city of Kars as its capital). Its territory was ceded to Turkey by the Soviet Union in the Treaty of Kars. The provinces of Ardahan and Iğdır were until the 1990s part of Kars Province.

Districts

Kars province is divided into 8 districts (ilçe), each named after the administrative center of the district:

• Akyaka
• Arpaçay
• Digor
• Kağızman
• Kars
• Sarıkamış
• Selim
• Susuz

There are 383 villages in Kars.

Armenian Monuments

Kars contains numerous Armenian monuments, the most notable being the the ruined city of Ani and the 9th century Church of the Apostles. While there have been recent government led efforts to preserve the province's more conspicuous Armenian structures, mostly for tourism purposes, there is telling evidence that suggests many of these monuments have been intentionally destroyed or severely damaged since the territory passed into Turkish hands.^[1]

Trivia

Kars was also the setting for the popular novel Snow by Orhan Pamuk.

External links

• Pictures of the capital of this province and of nearby Ani
• Kars Weather Forecast Information

References