00:00Presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin will hold a high-stakes meeting about the
00:05Ukraine war on Friday in Alaska, which the United States bought from Russia more than
00:10150 years ago.
00:13Russian influence still endures in parts of the remote state on the northwest edge of
00:17the North American continent, which extends just a few miles from Russia.
00:22When Danish explorer White is bearing first sailed through the narrow strait that separates
00:26Asia and the Americas in 1728, it was on an expedition for Tsarist Russia.
00:32The discovery of what is now known as the Bering Strait revealed the existence of Alaska to
00:37the west.
00:38However, indigenous people had been living there for thousands of years.
00:43Bering's expedition kicked off a century of Russian seal hunting, with the first conley
00:47set up on the southern Koreak island.
00:51In 1799, Tsar Paul I established the Russian-American Company to take advantage of the lucrative
00:57fur trade, which often involved clashes with the indigenous inhabitants.
01:01However, the hunters over-exploited the seals and sea otters whose populations collapsed,
01:07taking with them the settlers' economy.
01:11The Russian Empire sold the territory to Washington for $7.2 million in 1867.
01:18The purchase of an area more than twice the size of Texas was widely criticised in the
01:23US at the time.
01:24Even dubbed Seward's Folly after the deal's mastermind, Secretary of State William Seward.
01:30The Russian Orthodox Church established itself in Alaska after the creation of the Russian-American
01:35Company and remains one of the most significant remaining Russian influences in the state.
01:41More than 35 churches, some with distinctive onion-shaped domes, dot the Alaskan coast, according
01:49to an organisation dedicated to preserving the buildings.
01:53Alaska's Orthodox diocese says it is the oldest in North America and even maintains a seminary
01:59on Kodiak Island.
02:01A local dialect derived from Russian mixed with indigenous languages survived for decades
02:07in various communities, particularly near the state's largest city, Anchorage, though
02:13it has now essentially vanished.
02:16However, near the massive glaciers on the southern Kenai Peninsula, the Russian language is still
02:22being taught.
02:23A small rural school of an Orthodox community known as the Old Believers set up in the 1960s
02:30teaches Russian to around a hundred students.
02:34One of the most famous statements about the proximity of Alaska and Russia was made in 2008
02:40by Sara Palin, the state's then-governor, and the vice-presidential pick of Republican candidate
02:46John McCain.
02:48While it's not possible to see Russia from the Alaskan mainland, two islands facing each
03:01other in the Bering Strait are separated by just 2.5 miles.
03:08Russia's Big Diamete Island is just west of the American Little Diamete Island, where
03:13a few dozen people live.
03:15Further south, two Russians landed on the remote St. Lawrence island, which is a few dozen
03:21miles away from the Russian coast, in October 2022 to seek asylum.
03:27They fled just weeks after Putin ordered an unpopular mobilisation of citizens to boast his
03:33invasion on Ukraine.
03:35For years, the US military has said it regularly intercepts Russian aircraft that venture too
03:40close to the American airspace in the region.
03:44However, Russia is ostensibly not interested in reclaiming the territory it once held, with
03:49Putin saying in 2014 that Alaska is too cold.
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