Forests, mountains, and steppe make up a large part of the geography.
A majority of the people are Tuvans, but Russian is also spoken extensively. Tuva is governed by the Great Khural which elects a chairman for a four-year term. The current chairman is Sholban Kara-ool.
The Xiongnu Empire (209 BC-93 CE) governed the territory of modern Tuva. The identity of the ethnic core of Xiongnu has been a subject of varied hypotheses. Proposals by scholars include Mongolic and Turkic. Tatar Mongols lived in Tuva and they moved to Lake Hulun.The Oirat Mongols lived in eastern Tuva and they moved to the south.
The territory of Tuva has been ruled by the Mongolic Xianbei state (93-234), Rouran Khaganate (330-555), Mongol Empire (1206-1368), Northern Yuan (1368-1691), Khotgoid Khanate and Zunghar Khanate (1634-1758). The historic region of Tannu Uriankhai, of which Tuva is a part, was controlled by the Mongols from 1207 to 1758, when it was brought under Manchu rule (Qing Dynasty until 1911).
During the 1911 revolution in China, tsarist Russia formed a separatist movement among the Tuvans. Tsar Nicholas II ordered Russian troops into Tuva in 1912, as Russian settlers were allegedly being attacked[citation needed]. Tuva became nominally independent as the Urjanchai Republic before being brought under Russian protectorate as Uryankhay Kray under Tsar Nicholas II on 17 April 1914. This move was apparently requested by a number of prominent Tuvans, including the High Lama, although it is possible they were actually acting under the coercion of Russian soldiers[citation needed]. A Tuvan capital was established, called Belotsarsk (Белоца́рск; literally, "(Town) of the White Tsar"). Meanwhile, in 1911, Mongolia became independent, though under Russian protection.
Following the Russian Revolution of 1917 which ended the imperial autocracy, most of Tuva was occupied from 5 July 1918 to 15 July 1919 by Aleksandr Kolchak's "White" Russian troops. Pyotr Ivanovich Turchaninov was named governor of the territory. In the autumn of 1918 the southwestern part was occupied by Chinese troops and the southern part by Mongol troops led by Khatanbaatar Magsarjav.[citation needed] From July 1919 to February 1920 the communist Red Army controlled Tuva, but from 19 February 1920 to June 1921 it was occupied by China (governor was Yan Shichao [traditional, Wade–Giles transliteration: Yan Shi-ch'ao]).
On August 14, 1921 the Bolsheviks established a Tuvan People's Republic, popularly called Tannu-Tuva. In 1926, the capital (Belotsarsk; Khem-Beldyr since 1918) was renamed Kyzyl, meaning "red". Tuva was de jure an independent state between the World Wars. The state's first ruler, Prime Minister Donduk, sought to strengthen ties with Mongolia and establish Buddhism as the state religion. This unsettled the Kremlin, which orchestrated a coup carried out in 1929 by five young Tuvan graduates of Moscow's Communist University of the Toilers of the East. In 1930 the pro-Soviet region discarded the state's Mongol script in favor of a Latin alphabet designed for Tuva by Russian linguists, and in 1943 Cyrillic script replaced the Latin. Under the leadership of Party Secretary Salchak Toka, ethnic Russians were granted full citizenship rights and Buddhist and Mongol influences on the Tuvan state and society were systematically reduced.
The Soviet Union annexed Tuva outright in 1944, with the approval of Tuva's Little Khural (parliament). The exact circumstances surrounding Tannu-Tuva's incorporation into the USSR in 1944 remain obscure. Salchak Toka, the leader of Tuvan communists, was given the title of First Secretary of the Tuvan Communist Party, and became the de facto ruler of Tuva until his death in 1973. Tuva was made the Tuvan Autonomous Oblast and then became the Tuva ASSR on October 10, 1961.
Russian President Vladimir Putin in Tuva
In February 1990, the Tuvan Democratic Movement was founded by Kaadyr-ool Bicheldei, a philologist at Kyzyl University. The party aimed to provide jobs and housing (both were in short supply), and also to improve the status of Tuvan language and culture. Later on in the year there was a wave of attacks against Tuva's sizeable Russian community, resulting in 88 deaths. Russian troops eventually were called in. Many Russians moved out of the republic during this period. To this day, Tuva remains remote and difficult to access.
Tuva was a signatory to the March 31, 1992 treaty that created the Russian Federation. A new constitution for the republic was drawn up on October 22, 1993. This created a 32-member parliament (Supreme Khural) and a Grand Khural, which is responsible for foreign policy and any possible changes to the constitution, and ensures that Tuvan law is given precedence. The constitution also allowed for a referendum if Tuva ever sought independence. This constitution was passed by 53.9% (or 62.2%, according to source) of Tuvans in a referendum on December 12, 1993. At the same time, the official name was changed from Tuva (Тува) to Tyva (Тыва)
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