Tatarstan: A unique republic, A unique investment opportunity
What investors say about investing in Tatarstan
Tatarstan: supporting innovative start-ups
Tatarstan in the capital markets
Tatar banks expand with help of western capital
Taking Tatarstan’s petrochemical resources into the future
Tatarstan’s new Special Economic Zone Alabuga
Tatarstan’s thousands of years of culture
Kazan: home to some of the best sports facilities in Russia
The Bulgars were conquered by the Mongol khans in 1236, who set up Kazan as one of the key towns of the Volga Bulgaria. Later on Kazan became the capital of the Kazan Khanate, which left the Golden Horde. It finally fell to Ivan the Terrible in 1552, who destroyed all the mosques in the city and forcefully converted the Tatars to Christianity. The Russian Empire then forbid the construction of any mosques until 1776.
The region and the Tatar people remained a proud and rich part of imperial Russia with a history of tolerance.
When the USSR collapsed, Tatarstan looked like it could become a sovereign state. Raphael Khakimov, a famous historian and adviser to the president of Tatarstan, says: "The Tatars have always had the desire to rule themselves, not as an ethnic state like Chechnya, but as an autonomous state.