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Kiruna Municipality

Kiruna Municipality
Kiruna kommun
Municipality
Coat of arms of Kiruna Municipality
Coat of arms
Kiruna Municipality in Norrbotten County.png
Coordinates: 67°51′N 020°13′E / 67.850°N 20.217°E / 67.850; 20.217Coordinates: 67°51′N 020°13′E / 67.850°N 20.217°E / 67.850; 20.217
Country Sweden
County Norrbotten County
Seat Kiruna
Area
 • Total 20,551.42 km2 (7,934.95 sq mi)
 • Land 19,140.33 km2 (7,390.12 sq mi)
 • Water 1,411.09 km2 (544.82 sq mi)
  Area as of January 1, 2014.
Population (December 31, 2016)
 • Total 23,167
 • Density 1.1/km2 (2.9/sq mi)
Time zone CET (UTC+1)
 • Summer (DST) CEST (UTC+2)
ISO 3166 code SE
Province Lapland
Municipal code 2584
Website www.kiruna.se

Kiruna Municipality (Swedish: Kiruna kommun, Finnish: Kiirunan kunta, Northern Sami: Girona gielda) is a municipality in Norrbotten County in northernmost Sweden. Its seat is located in Kiruna. It is the northernmost municipality in Sweden, and at 20,715 square kilometres (7,998 sq mi) is Sweden's geographically largest covering roughly 4.604% of its total area.

Finnish, Meänkieli and Sami have the official status of being minority languages in the municipality.

During the 20th century the mining settlement Kiruna was built in the parish of Jukkasjärvi, at that time a rural municipality in very remote territory. A so-called municipalsamhälle (which was a kind of borough established within a rural municipality to take care of some matters of urban character) was instituted in 1908. The settlement grew (it even had a tramway system) and it was decided to make it a city. On January 1, 1948 the whole parish of Jukkasjärvi was transformed into the City of Kiruna. As the vast wilderness around the town itself was included, Kiruna was at that time regarded as the largest city municipality in the world. Only a few more cities were instituted in Sweden, the last one in 1951. Instead the differences between the three types of municipalities were diminished and finally abolished altogether. In 1971 Kiruna, as all others, became a unitary municipality and at the same time merged with Karesuando.


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