WORLD HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -Thousands of inmates of Stalin’s gulag labour camps died building a road across the far-flung Russian region of Kolyma, where winter temperatures, on average, hold at –38° Celsius. The route became known as the ‘Road of Bones’.

Detailed explanation-2: -Why? Kolyma region in general and Road of Bones in particular became sadly famous after road was built here by USSR government in the 30-50th years. It was built almost without machines with labor force of prisoners that were sent here from all the USSR by fake cases, mostly as enemies of the state.

Detailed explanation-3: -The Kolyma Highway is colloquially known as the Road of Bones (Russian: , transliteration: Doróga Kostyéy), in reference to the hundreds of thousands of forced laborers who were interred in the pavement after dying during its construction.

Detailed explanation-4: -The prisoners’ slave labour was used in timber production and mining and on gigantic construction projects (the White Sea Canal, dams, motorways, and railways). After Stalin’s death in 1953, the number of prisoners declined considerably and the Gulag was officially done away with in 1960.

Detailed explanation-5: -Kolyma highway – also known as “the Road of Bones” or “the Route of Death” – stretches 2, 000 km through deepest northeast Russia. Built during the Stalin era between 1932 and 1953, it is lined with hundreds of labour camps set up after significant gold deposits were discovered in the region.