East Kazakhstan

East Kazakhstan Province is a province of Kazakhstan. It occupies the easternmost part of Kazakhstan, along both sides of the Irtysh River and Lake Zaysan. Its capital is Oskemen (also referred to as Ust-Kamenogorsk). The province borders Russia in the north and northeast and the People's Republic of China (Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region) in the south and southeast. The easternmost point of the Oblast is also very near, within 50 kilometers or so of the westernmost tip of Mongolia; however, Kazakhstan and Mongolia do not share a common border, the two countries being separated by a small part of Russia and China.It also borders the Kazakh Provinces of Pavlodar Province (to the north west), Karagandy Province (to the west) and Almaty Province (to the south). The province was created by the merger of two Soviet-era Kazakhstan oblasts: the old Vostochno-Kazakhstanskaya (East Kazakhstan) Oblast and Semipalatinsk Oblast. 65% of the population is ethnic Kazakh and 30% Russian.