Polvokia
Polvokian Federation Полвокская Федерация | |
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 Flag
Emblem
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| Location of Polvokia within Septentrion. Light green areas are disputed. Location of Polvokia within Septentrion. Light green areas are disputed. | |
| Capital and | Sirivan |
| Official languages | Letnevian, Polin |
| Recognised regional languages | Menghean, Ketchva, Sirivan |
| Ethnic groups (2017) |
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| Demonym(s) | Polvokian |
| Government | Federal semi-presidential constitutional republic |
• President | Boris Volinski |
• Prime Minister | Bodonchar Kazloǔski |
| Federal Assembly | |
| Assembly of Nationalities | |
| Establishment | |
• First unified state | 815 CE |
• Independence from Menghe | 1514 |
• First Letnevian colony | 1708 |
• Independence from Letnev | 1882 |
• Current constitution | 2000 |
| Area | |
• | 5,080,337.83 km2 (1,961,529.40 sq mi) (2) |
| Population | |
• 2017 census | 54,342,981 |
• Density | 10.7/km2 (27.7/sq mi) |
| GDP (PPP) | 2017 estimate |
• Total | $898 billion |
• Per capita | $16,525 |
| GDP (nominal) | 2017 estimate |
• Total | $643 billion |
• Per capita | $11,832 |
| Gini (2015) | 34.3 medium |
| HDI (2017) |  0.775high |
| Currency | Polvokian ruble |
• Summer (DST) | (UTC +7 to +9) |
| Date format | dd.mm.yyyy |
| Driving side | right |
| Calling code | +34 |
| Internet TLD | .po |
Polvokia (Letnevian: Полвокия, tr. Polvokiya), officially the Polvokian Federation (Letnevian: Полвокская Федерация, tr. Polvokskaya Federatsiya) is a sovereign country in Northeastern Hemithea. It has a land area of 5,080,338 square kilometers (1,961,529 square miles) and spans two time zones. Counterclockwise from West to South, it is bordered by Nukkumaa, Themiclesia, Dzhungestan, Menghe, and Dayashina. Most of the population is concentrated in the south of the country near the Menghean and Dayashinese borders; the northern reaches of the country are cold and inhospitable for most of the year. Sarantsk, located on the southern coast, is Polvokia's capital and also its largest city.
Prior to the 18th century, Polvokia was populated by a number of indigenous peoples, the largest of which form today's Polin, Ketchva, and Sirian ethnic groups. A Polin-led kingdom under King Kunik unified much of the southern plain in the 9th century; from that point onward, the territory alternated between unification, division, and Menghean vassal status until the 18th century, when Letnevian fur traders settled on the coast and began expanding inland. During the War of ------------, the colony took advantage of Letnev's weakness by declaring its independence, though it lost some of its southern territory in the process. Divided by ethnic inequality and rural fragmentation, in 1917 Polvokia launched a revolution mimicking Letnev's own, and formed a close relationship with the Federation of Socialist Republics in the decades that followed. Ethnic tensions remained volatile, however, and in the 1990s Polvokia descended into a prolonged state of civil war.
Since the war's end in 2000, Polvokia has been a federal semi-presidential constitutional republic. Each province, based around its largest ethnic group, has its own legislature and enjoys considerable autonomy from the center. Formally, the government is fully democratic, but in practice the multi-ethnic United Front (EF) party has maintained a monopoly on political power since the end of the civil war. Many international human rights groups consider Polvokia to be an unconsolidated or illiberal democracy, with nominally democratic institutions but extensive corruption and inconsistent rule of law.
Etymology
The term Polvokia is believed to have originated with the Menghean Pobuk (浦北 / 포북), meaning "north of the riverbank" - a term which past Menghean dynasties applied to various nomadic peoples living north of the Baek River, which today forms Menghe's border with Polvokia. Over time, and especially after direct Menghean rule in the 15th century, the local population came to refer to the territory under the dialectical variant Polvok, which Letnevian settlers adopted into the name of their colony.
An alternative theory, popular among nationalists, is that the term comes from the Polvo, an ancient tribe which ruled the region more than two millenia ago before breaking up into Polins, Ketchvas, Sirivans, and other northern indigenous groups. Advocates of this theory note that the Classical Menghean pronunciation of 浦北 differs too greatly from its modern reading, while skeptics have argued that there is little evidence the Polvo existed as a unified tribe.
History
Early history
The first written records of a Polvokian people date to the 3rd century BCE, when scribes from the State of Yang, today part of Menghe, mentioned a "people of hunters and reindeer-herders living in the north." Early Mengheans regarded the "Pobuk" people as barbarians, citing in particular their nomadic lifestyle and their tradition, adopted from the neighboring Dzhung, of drinking wine from skull cups crafted from the heads of their enemies. Unlike the Dzhung, however, early tribes in what is now Polvokia were relatively peaceful, and did not organize major incursions onto Menghean territory unless threatened by invasion.
Beginning in the 3rd century CE, some tribes on the southern plains began settling down in permanent farming communities, where they cultivated wheat and sorghum. In time, these towns and villages grew into city-states and small kingdoms. Trade in fur, felt, and later alluvial gold emerged in this early period, both between city states and with Jin dynasty Menghe.
Olch and Polvuk Kingdoms
During the early 9th century, King Kunik of Olch managed to unite a broad swath of the southern territory under his control, proclaiming the united Kingdom of Olch in 815. At its greatest extent, this kingdom covered most of the southern plain, but did not extend beyond the Sakhal mountains. During this period, the transition to sedentary agriculture advanced quickly, and Olch engineers began building stone forts along the border, some of which still stand today. Trade with Menghe's Jin and Sunghwa dynasties flourished, and the Olch kingdom became relatively prosperous.
In 1136, King Fiyanggū died of poisoning, sparking a dispute over royal succession. This led to a period of fragmentation, with four large kingdoms and dozens of smaller ones fighting for control of the throne. Attacks from Ketchva and Sirivan nomads to the north also chipped away at the divided states.
Seeing an opportunity amidst the northern kingdoms' division, the Chŏnsun Emperor of Menghe's ascendant Ŭi dynasty organized the first Northern Expedition in 1298, which led to the conquest and annexation of the southernmost three states. Another Northern Expedition followed in the mid-15th century, extending Ŭi control further north. During this period, there was a large migration of ethnic Meng into southern Polvokia, especially the areas near the Baek river and in what is now continental Dayashina.
After the Menghean Black Plague toppled the Ŭi dynasty and crippled Menghe's military, ethnic Polin nobles rose up and away from Menghean control, forming the independent Kingdom of Polvuk. Like the Kingdom of Olch, it was ruled by a Polin king and followed a feudal division of government. With the help of a frigid winter that set in as the enemy army laid siege, Polvuk withstood a Myŏn dynasty invasion in 1657-1658, a period which is still remembered as its greatest historical triumph.
Colonization and independence
By the end of the 17th century, the Kingdom of Polvuk was at its nadir, with many lords at the periphery exercising de-facto independence from the king. When Letnevian traders established a permanent fishing and hunting colony in Sankt-Konstansburg in 1708, they encountered little resistance from the local population, and were soon able to extend their control up and down the coast. The organized southern kingdoms, which still relied on light cavalry and peasant levies, perished before Letnevian troops armed with muskets and cannons, and by 1790 the Letnevian colony, renamed Polvokia, extended south of the Baek river.
In 1882, after the --------- war erupted between Letnev and the breakaway territory of Mozria, Novak VI, a former noble with mixed Polin and Letnevian blood, overthrew the Governor-General and established the independent Polvokian Empire. With Letnevian forces distracted on the mainland and unable to reach their Western ports, he was quickly able to overwhelm the colonial garrisons, but Sinŭi-Menghean and Dayashinese troops exploited the colony's weakness to attack its southern edge, retaking territories which they had claimed during the period of Menghean colonization. In 1894, Sinŭi troops attacked again, seizing the southern territory of Transbelaiya which today forms Menghe's Sinbukgang Province.
Faced with intensifying ethnic divisions inside the country, and humiliated by multiple defeats against rising East Hemithean powers, the Polvokian Empire was soon plunged into a period of instability. Emperor Novak VII attempted to implement democratic reforms in 1901, but his successor Novak VIII reversed course, using fierce repression and internal exile to maintain his grip on power. Hoping to forcefully modernize the agricultural sector, Novak VIII's government issued new laws controlling what crops farmers could plant, leading to a severe famine in 1908 as foreign crops perished in an early winter. Resistance came in the form of many political and ethnic organizations, but the largest was the United Congress of Workers and Farmers (RKES), a Communist organization with ties to revolutionaries in Letnev proper.
Polvokian People's Republic
After Letnev's own monarchy fell to Communist revolutionaries in 1917, the Polvokian RKES launched a copycat revolution the following year, killing Novak VIII and his family in a bombing attack and seizing control of the Mountain Palace in Altai. For several years, they struggled to regain control over the vast northern steppe, where many minority ethnic groups had established de-facto independence. Hoping to prevent further instability, the nascent Polvokian People's Republic granted special autonomy to ethnic minorities, ending two centuries of Letnevian dominance.
Diplomatically, the PPR enjoyed close relations with the Federation of Socialist Republics, which was linguistically and ideologically similar. Yet plans in the 1920s to unify the two countries as a global Union of Soviets ultimately stalled at the negotiating table, as multi-ethnic Polvokian leaders refused to follow the FSR by imposing Orthodox Christianity as the state religion.
During the early 1930s, Polvokia had a tense relationship with the Greater Menghean Empire, with an indecisive border skirmish in 1933 leading to a Polvokian victory. Upon coming to power in 1935, Chairman Milo Kruskal restored the "international revolution policy," building up domestic industrial capacity and improving ethnic equality in an effort to better withstand foreign invasions. In 1937, Kim Myŏng-hwan concluded a Treaty of Friendship with Polvokia in order to focus his attention westward, agreeing to a non-aggression pact and enabling trade between the two countries. Throughout the Pan-Septentrion War, Polvokia exported coal, oil, ore, and lumber to Menghe, but officially remained neutral; after the war's end, the Casaterran Allies suggested an invasion, but the FSR remained firmly opposed, fearing that if the Polvokian People's Republic were toppled a Capitalist regime would emerge in its place.
The Polvokian People's Republic was an influential player in Septentrion's Cold War, and for much of that conflict it was the FSR's only close ally in East Hemithea. During the Menghean War of Liberation, Polvokia shipped small arms and, later, tanks and heavy vehicles across the border to Communist resistance forces, including an arms smuggling ring led by Ryŏ Ho-jun. In 1975, Miroslav Khaimov's government launched a renewed industrial and military buildup program, seeking to modernize an economy still dependent on primary goods.
Khaimov's administration also ushered in a descent back into ethnic inequality, with Letnevians gaining disproportionate influence in government posts. His economic reforms, which favored heavy industry in the south, mainly benefited Letnevians and to a lesser extent Meng, but neglected the Polin, Ketchva, and Sirivan minorities. In an effort to modernize the countryside and free up more land for mining, Khaimov ordered the villagization of nomadic peoples, sparking deep opposition in the northern provinces.
Civil war and stabilization
Following eight years of shortages and an overall downturn in the economy, as well as policies that discriminated against minority groups, Ketchvans staged a protest in the city of Kremen in 1990 to demand higher wages and more equal representation. Unwilling to negotiate, state security forces violently suppressed the protest, leading to further rioting in rural areas. Major insurgencies emerged in the Ketchvan and Sirivan Oblasts, and by 1993 state security forces were unable to cross the Ergaki mountains on major roads and railways. Reports soon emerged that state forces had engaged in systematic attacks on Ketchvan and Sirivan civilians, on a scale that some observers compared to ethnic cleansing.
As news of atrocities on both sides worsened, Dayashina and the Organized States lobbied for a military intervention by the GA; but the Federation of Socialist Republics threatened nuclear war if an intervention took place, on the grounds that Polvokia was still bound by its former membership in the Turov Pact. The FSR's defense of the Khaimov regime, seen by Choe Sŭng-min as a former lackey of Ryŏ Ho-jun, led to a severe chilling of relations with the new regime in Menghe, especially after ethnic Meng became caught in the crossfire.
In the absence of foreign intervention, the Second Polvokian Civil War dragged on until 1998, when a moderate faction in his government organized a takeover. Led by an alliance of Polin and Letnevians, but with ties to other ethnic groups, the moderate faction negotiated a ceasefire and promised to restore ethnic harmony within a federal system. The new constitution, ratified in 2000, guaranteed equal rights for minority groups, and set up a nominally democratic government with greater autonomy for individual provinces. Rather than seeking revenge on perpetrators of violence, the new government set up a truth and reconciliation commission based on principles of restorative justice. Miroslav Khaimov and his closest allies were offered immunity from war-crimes prosecution as part of the peace deal, but the ex-Chairman still fled to the FSR, where he died of natural causes in 2013.
Geography and climate
Polvokia occupies the northeastern corner of the continent of Hemithea, separated from the continent's central shield by the Yary-Tenitsyn gulf system. Its long coastline stretches from the Arctic Ocean to the Vladizapad Sea, then briefly terminates at Dayashima before resuming again in the East Menghe Sea. Polvokia's land neighbors - Dayashina, Menghe, Dzhungestan, Themiclesia, and Nukkumaa - are all members of the North Hemithean Economic Association. By land area, it is the second-largest country in Septentrion, second only to Nukkumaa.
Polvokia's landmass is dominated by the Sakhal Mountains, which stretch from the Dzhungestani border to the Northeastern Plateau. The Sakhal Range includes Mount Pobeda, the highest mountain on the continent of Hemithea, a major attraction for climbers. Polvokia's northern expanse contains many rivers carrying meltwater over the permafrost, but its southern area has only two, the Zeya River through two eponymous Oblasts and the Baek River (locally known as the Belaya river) which forms most of the border with Menghe. Much of the northeastern area is covered by evergreen forests, with steppes to the west.
Outside the mountains, northern expanses are covered by a vast expanse taiga, turning into tundra on the arctic coast. The country's central belt is influenced by Hemithea's broader monsoon system, with relatively dry winters and rainy summers. Due to the frigid conditions, there are few permanent settlements in the north, apart from oil wells, military outposts, and traditional herding villages. Most of the population lives in the Southern Plain beneath the Sakhals, where all the country's major cities are located.
All of Polvokia's large administrative units use the SST +7 time zone, except for the Southern Territory and Northeastern Territory, which use SST +8.
Politics
Polvokia's current political system, as laid out in the 2000 Constitution, was the result of two years of negotiation between representatives of Polvokia's major ethnic communities. It was intended to preserve an adequate degree of political unity while still preventing any one ethnic group from imposing its will over the others.
Federal government
Polvokia has a semi-presidential system or more specifically a president-premier system. The president is subject to a two-stage popular vote; all parties run their candidates in the first round, and the two candidates with the most votes go on to a second round in which an absolute majority is required. Once in office, the president can appoint a prime minister and a cabinet, and retains the power to dismiss them - but both decisions require a majority vote from both houses of the legislature. By convention, post-2000 governments have signaled national unity by splitting the top two offices between a Polin and a Letnevian. Presidential elections are held every four years, and the president is limited to two terms in office, but can later go on to serve as Prime Minister.
Polvokia's legislature follows a bicameral system. The Federal Assembly has the greatest authority, including the power to recall the prime minister, while the Assembly of Nationalities only has authority over issues directly relating to ethnic relations. Delegates to the 84-seat Federal Assembly are elected to two-year terms and serve single-seat districts; like the president, they must pass a two-tier election, winning an absolute majority in the second round. The 315 delegates to the Assembly of Nationalities, by contrast, assigns a certain number of seats for each ethnic group within each federal-level unit, and allows seats to be filled in accordance with local tradition. Sirivan delegates in the northeast, for example, are selected by tribal councils, while Meng and Letnevian delegates are popularly elected on a two-tier basis from single-seat districts.
The United Front coalition, composed of the incumbent "Forward Together" party and a few coalition allies, has controlled the presidency and legislature since it came to power in 2000, raising serious concerns about the degree of real democratic competition in Polvokia. Both national and regional Election Commissions are ethnically representative, but most of their members are affiliated with the United Front, and there is little transparency about campaign laws or nomination procedures. The election in 2016 of Boris Volinski, widely perceived as outgoing President Naranbaatar Mihailov's handpicked successor, set off protests in the capital and provoked criticism from Radio Free Hemithea and a number of pro-democracy NGOs.
Evidence of direct electoral fraud is rare, but other aspects of the system are designed to favor established incumbent parties. The requirement for runoff votes, especially in gerrymandered Federal Assembly districts, makes it difficult for parties with regional or ethnic appeal to win absolute majorities, and in ethnic-majority districts the United Front has run coalition allies appealing to the local ethnic group. Forward Together's sprawling media empire has also given it an upper hand in campaigning, and its consistent record of political stability and economic growth has earned it genuine popularity.
Administrative divisions
The Polvokian Federation is divided into a total of twelve administrative units below the national level: three territories, eight oblasts, and one federal city. Due to their very sparse populations, territories are directly administered by the central government, but guarantee certain rights to nomadic groups under their jurisdiction. Oblasts enjoy the widest range of federal rights, and have their own legislatures, police agencies, and education policies. The capital city, Sarantsk, is not part of any oblast and has its own federal government.
Following the 2000 constitution, Oblasts are further divided into two types. The four Autonomous Oblasts are designed to protect an ethnic group which makes up a majority of the local population and has historically faced discrimination. In these areas, the local language enjoys official status and the legislature has broad authority over culturally sensitive policies. The four Consociational Oblasts, established in 2000, have more mixed populations, with Letnevians and Polins as the largest groups and significant communities of Meng and Ketchvans. In these units, policymaking is designed to be more inclusive, and legislatures, courts, and the police and civil service are required to contain roughly proportional numbers of each ethnic group.
Justice system
Polvokia uses a civil law system, enforced by the sprawling Ministry of Justice. As part of the government's federal structure, Oblasts are given broad powers to set their own criminal law statutes, but cannot overrule laws passed by the federal government.
The individual Oblasts and the Federal City of Sarantsk all operate their own police forces, known as the Militsiya, while the three territories are managed by Territorial Police subordinate to the federal government. The MVD troops, previously responsible for centralized policing, were disbanded in 2000, but a Federal Police Agency similar in role was reconstituted in 2008 to coordinate criminal investigations across Oblast boundaries.
Corruption is a major problem in the Polvokian police force, especially in rural and lower-income areas where police salaries are relatively low. The federal requirement that all courts and police forces make a "good-faith effort" to proportionally represent the distribution of ethnic groups in the raion or municipality over which they exercise jurisdiction has also led to reports of local agencies auctioning off positions in exchange for bribes or other payments.
Economy
With a nominal GDP per capita of $11,832, Polvokia is a middle-income country. Economic growth slowed down during the 1990s due to armed conflict in the southwest and international sanctions, but has since accelerated due to an oil and gas boom, with year-to-year GDP growth averaging 5.5% from 2007 to 2017. Nevertheless, new jobs are mainly concentrated in the rural north, and unemployment in the southern Oblasts remains relatively high at 9%.
The country's economic landscape is dominated by large state-owned enterprises, many of which were established in the 1960s to 1980s and have since been taken over by the Forward Together party. Inefficiency in the state sector is a major problem, compounded by the use of outdated plants and equipment. President Yanovich promised major restructuring during his first term in office, hoping to emulate Menghe's miracle growth, but major oligarchs have resisted changes which would deprive them of their holdings, and Forward Together has been reluctant to cede its strong influence over development.
The Forward Together party embraces a dirigiste economic policy, favoring an active role for the state as opposed to a neoliberal Laissez-faire approach. Polvokia joined the Association of Coordinated Market Economies in 2001, and has sought to emulate Menghe's economic reforms with limited success.
Polvokia's main industries lie in the natural resources sector: coal, gas, timber, and various ores. The country's northern mountain ranges have particularly rich deposits of iron, copper, and magnesium, as well as several strategic uranium mines.
Polvokia also has large reserves of oil, which are mainly concentrated in the vast northern coastal plains. Total oil extraction in 2016 averaged 3.3 million bbl/day, and has increased steadily since 2003. A large pipeline network, recently capped by the Sonetsk Corridor through Dzhungestan, brings oil to coastal processing centers and across the Menghean border. Recent exploratory studies have determined that Polvokia possesses large, untapped reserves of shale oil, which the government has moved to exploit.
Heavy industry, including steel production, is concentrated in the south. Factory infrastructure in the southwest suffered particularly heavily during the civil war and never fully recovered, creating problems with unemployment in the disproportionately Ketchvan region. Since 2001, low-cost competition from Menghe and lingering problems with inefficient management led to a steady decline in Polvokian steel production, though there were signs of a recovery in 2016.
Polvokia's largest trading partner is Menghe, which purchases 72% of its exports and provides 61% of its imports. Menghe's rapid economic growth, especially in the chemicals, construction, and heavy industry sectors, generated strong demand for Polvokian raw materials, including coal, oil, and natural gas for heating and power generation. Since 2002, Menghean contract enterprises have invested enormous sums of money in expanding extraction and transportation capacity in Polvokia, contributing to the resources boom but setting off protests among unemployed steelworkers and indigenous populations.
Military
Polvokia's total armed forces currently have an estimated strength of 350,000 personnel. The size of the military declined under the Yanovich presidency as funds were diverted to reconstruction, but Presidents Mihailov and Volinski have restored the force to its pre-Civil War size. Since 2012, the Polvokian armed forces have also worked to modernize their equipment, relying primarily on imported arms from Menghe to supplement existing stocks of Letnevian equipment.
Polvokia retains a policy of conscription, in which all adult men are eligible to be called up for eighteen months of military service; in practice, only about half of all eligible 18-year-old males are selected each year. The PPR-era conscription system was kept in place due to fears that a volunteer military would be dominated by Letnevians or Polins, and conscripts of all ethnic backgrounds serve in mixed units, a policy which has helped maintain a sense of national unity. Reformers also required the Polvokian Officers' Academy to accept proportional numbers of each major ethnic group, though in practice Meng and Letnevians still make up a disproportionate share of the officer corps and all commands are issued in the Letnevian language.
The Polvokian Army's active forces consist of four Motor-Rifle Divisions, two Tank Divisions, four Air Defense Brigades, and one Special Forces Battalion, in addition to various supporting elements. An additional twelve Divisions (six Motor-Rifle, two Tank, four Infantry) can be called up as reserves. Divisional organization is based on the FSR's model, but incorporates some changes proposed with the help of Menghean advisers.
Polvokia participated in Menghe's coalition during the Innominadan Crisis, and currently has its 1st Motor-Rifle Division and the 4th Tank Division deployed in the Republic of Innominada as part of the Namhae Front force on the border.
Polvokia's Navy consists of:
- 2 Chŏndong-class destroyers
- 4 Jŏngdŏk-class frigates
- 3 Krivak-class frigates
- 12 Bbarŭn-class submarines
- 2 Ri Sun-hŭi class corvettes
- 4 modernized Tarantul-III corvettes
- 12 Type 1062 missile boats
- Various patrol and rescue craft
Foreign relations
After the fall of Miroslav Khaimov's government, Polvokia's relations with the Federation of Socialist Republics experienced a distinct chill. The new government announced that it would not remain in the Commonwealth of North Casaterran States (CNCS), and despite Prime Minister Yanovich's attempt at repairing relations in 2003, resentment over the civil war period still clouds FSR-Polvokian relations. Further conflict surrounds the expansion in 2007 of Narod, a far-right opposition party catering to Letnevian ethnic nationalists. The Polvokian government has accused the FSR of providing covert aid, including funds and intelligence, to Narod, whose nationalist message and open support for Miroslav Khaimov threaten Polvokian unity.
Shortly after coming to power, President Naranbaatar Mihailov launched a "pivot south" policy aimed at improving relations with Menghe. The two countries signed a bilateral defense agreement in 2009, and in 2015 Polvokia was one of the inaugural members of the newly-formed Namhae Front. Polvokia and Menghe have also promoted closer economic ties; as part of the latter's Northern Road project, Menghean companies will complete two new freight railways in Polvokia and help to refurbish existing lines.
Polvokia has a territorial dispute with Nukkumaa, stemming from a 19th-century treaty which set the eastern stretch of border along the narrow Ude river. Following a volcanic eruption and landslide in 1947, the upper Ude diverted to a northerly course along the tundra, and now flows into the Kirenga. The Polvokian People's Republic claimed that the border should follow the river's new course, while Nukkumaa has maintained the border at the river's original course, a claim which most countries recognize. Adding to the gravity of the dispute, in 2003 surveyors discovered a large, untapped oilfield northwest of Lake Tenitsyn. Since 2009, Menghean diplomats have attempted to mediate in the dispute, but both sides still man military outposts along the dry Ude riverbed.