Zaysan, place in East Kazakhstan Region, Kazakhstan

Zaysan is a town in the East Kazakhstan Region, the administrative centre of Zaysan District, set at 660 metres above sea level near the southeastern corner of Lake Zaysan. Seen from a distance, it forms a thin line of low structures on flat land: a slightly taller white building with a pale roof on the left, a longer reddish-brown building beside it, and a few small pale structures spaced further right.

Zaysan began in the 1830s–1840s as Jemeneyka, a settlement in the upper reaches of the Jemeney stream among dense forests. In 1864, by tsar's decree, it became a stanitsa fortified as a fortress by troops under Colonel I. F. Babkov, quartermaster of the Separate Siberian Corps. Its customs post carried wool, hides and timber to China, Tibet and Xinjiang, and brought back cloth and handicrafts. Renamed Zaysan between 1864 and 1868, it became the administrative centre of Zaysan uyezd.

The town was first called Dzhemeneyka, after the Zhemeney river whose upper reaches lie among the forests where its first stone was laid in the 1830s–1840s. Travellers from Semipalatinsk, Pavlodar and Ust-Kamenogorsk gave the tract the name Zaysan, official between 1864 and 1868. From 1860 the residents' livelihood was tied to Lake Zaysan and the Irtysh, and a May fair, the Nikolskaya, was held yearly.

The climate features hot summers with temperatures above 32 degrees Celsius and cold winters with frost and snow. Visitors should dress appropriately for the season and be prepared for rapid weather changes.

The Zaysan area was historically a key junction point between trade routes, and old paths still cross the region today. A main highway connects the town to Russia, showing how this place continues to hold a strategic role in the regional network.