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Aysen S. Nikolaev, Mayor of Yakutsk, appointed Acting Governor of Republic of Sakha by Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin

Aysen Nikolaev in Israel during the recent Israel Diamond Exchange 80th Anniversary celebrations, flanked by Alex Popov (left), President of Moscow Diamond Bourse and IDE President Yoram Dvash (right)
Aysen S. Nikolaev, who until recently served as the Mayor of Yakutsk, capital of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) Republic, was appointed as acting Governor of the Republic of Sakha by Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation.

Nikolaev, who holds M.A. degrees in Physics and Finance, takes a keen interest in the international diamond industry and trade, has traveled widely and visited, almost without exception, all diamond manufacturing and trading centers. His recent visit to Israel was coordinated by Alex Popov, President of the Moscow Diamond Exchange.

Aysen's first order of business of the newly appointed Governor was to meet with Sergey Ivanov, President of ALROSA at the Sakha Representative Office in Moscow.

Sakha Republic, also known as Yakutia, is the Russian Federation 's most important "diamond basket." Its soil holds, among many others, considerable reserves of oil, gas, coal, diamonds, gold, silver, tin, tungsten. Sakha, by means of the state-owned diamond company ALROSA, produces 99 percent of Russia's rough diamonds and over 25 percent of rough diamonds mined annually, worldwide.

Few realize how large the Republic of Sakha is. It comprises, according to Wikipedia, half of the Russian Federation's Far Eastern District, is the largest sub-national governing body by area in the world at 3,083,523 square kilometers (1,190,555 square miles)] and the eighth largest territory in the world. It is larger than Argentina and just smaller than India.