Seeking shapefile for countries of former Soviet Union

Question

I have data at the country level for the 15 countries of the former Soviet Union but does anyone have a shapefile?

My research assistant is claiming she cannot find one.

Answer 1

There is the GADM database where you can download Russian boundaries in a variety of formats suitable for QGIS and DIVA GIS where u can download data by country. Select and download free geographic (GIS) data for any country in the world.

Generalized political boundaries of the countries comprising the Former Soviet Union

Data formats: (Download data)

Arcview shapefile - fsucoal/views/shapes/cis.shp

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Answer 2

This is the data that comes from the MIT

https://geodata.mit.edu/catalog.html?f%5Bdc_format_s%5D%5B%5D=Shapefile&f%5Bdct_spatial_sm%5D%5B%5D=Uzbekistan&per_page=100&sort=dc_publisher_s+asc%2C+dc_title_sort+asc

For your reference : here is the information to ensure you get the right shapefiles

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-Soviet_states

Answer 3

A good general source for map data, including, but not limited to the political boundaries of the nations of the former Soviet Union, is Natural Earth.

Boundaries of nations and nation-like things are under the "cultural" category, and can be downloaded at a variety of resolutions (1:10,000,000; 1:50,000,000; 1:110,000,000) and a variety of organizing principles, including sovereignty, disputed areas, internal divisions (states/provinces), transportation systems, a point-map of populated places, and more.

In addition to cultural maps, Natural Earth provides vector data for physical features and raster maps.