Brahin

Brahin is a small historic town of around 4,600 people near the Ukrainian border in southeastern Homielskaja voblasć, on the Brahinka River, 28 km from the nearest railway station at Khoiniki. It is one of the oldest place-names in the region, first recorded in the Hypatian Codex in 1147 as a notable town of Kievan Rus'. In 1511 it received new privileges from King Sigismund I, and from the late 16th century it was held by the powerful Wiśniowiecki (Vishnevetsky) princely family, under whom the town reached its historical peak and gained a castle. Remnants of the Vishnevetsky castle walls and an 11th–13th-century ancient settlement site survive as the town's best-known landmarks today. Before the Second World War roughly half the town's population was Jewish; most were killed by German occupying forces in 1941. Brahin district lies within the zone contaminated by the 1986 Chernobyl disaster — 52 settlements in the district were resettled, and around 1,650 families left the town itself — but the town center is inhabited and safe to visit today, with agriculture, small-scale industry, and some ecotourism forming its modern economy.

• Bragin Historical Museum — Exhibits on the Chernobyl disaster and local history
• Vishnevetsky castle wall remnants — Surviving fragments of the castle built by the Wiśniowiecki family, the town's most famous landmark
• Ancient settlement site — Archaeological remains dating from the 11th–13th centuries

• Khoyniki (30 km north) — Exclusion zone gateway
• Loyew (50 km east) — Battle museum
• Gomel (120 km north-east) — Regional capital