Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture in the context of "Kyrgyz alphabets"

Strictly speaking, China's legal system neither recognizes the concept of "sub-provincial administrative divisions" (Chinese: 副省级行政区; pinyin: Fùshěngjí xíngzhèngqū) or "sub-provincial cities" (Chinese: 副省级城市; pinyin: Fùshěngjí chéngshì) nor provides specific legislation for such designations, and these categories are absent from official statistical classifications. The so-called sub-provincial divisions or sub-provincial cities refer to special administrative status granted to selected prefecture-level cities during specific historical periods. This status is operationally defined by appointing deputy provincial-level (deputy ministerial-level) officials as the top leaders of municipal party and government organs. Correspondingly, institutional heads under these jurisdictions hold ranks half a grade higher than their counterparts in regular prefecture-level administrative divisions – specifically, party and government department leaders are designated as deputy departmental-level officials.

China has 15 sub-provincial cities, including Dalian, Qingdao, Ningbo, Xiamen and Shenzhen and 5 separately planned cities (Chinese: 计划单列市). Additionally, the Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture in Xinjiang holds sub-provincial status as an autonomous prefecture, governing three administrative prefectures: the directly-administered counties and cities under Ili Prefecture, this refers specifically to the core jurisdictional area of Ili Profecture in its narrow administrative sense and also the administrative division-based statistical scope of the Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture, and Tacheng (Tarbagatay) Prefecture and Altay Prefecture.

Kazakh is a Turkic language of the Kipchak branch spoken in Central Asia by the Kazakhs. It is closely related to Nogai, Kyrgyz and Karakalpak. It is the official language of Kazakhstan, and has official status in the Altai Republic of Russia. It is also a minority language in the Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture in Xinjiang, China, and in the Bayan-Ölgii Province of western Mongolia. The language is also spoken by many ethnic Kazakhs throughout the former Soviet Union (some 472,000 in Russia according to the 2010 Russian census), Germany, and Turkey.

Like other Turkic languages, Kazakh is an agglutinative language and employs vowel harmony. Kazakh builds words by adding suffixes one after another to the word stem, with each suffix expressing only one unique meaning and following a fixed sequence. Ethnologue recognizes three mutually intelligible dialect groups: Northeastern Kazakh—the most widely spoken variety, which also serves as the basis for the official language—Southern Kazakh, and Western Kazakh. The language shares a degree of mutual intelligibility with the closely related Karakalpak language while its Western dialects maintain limited mutual intelligibility with the Altai languages.

Tacheng Prefecture, also known as Tarbagatay Prefecture, is located in northern Xinjiang, People's Republic of China. It has an area of 98,824 km (38,156 sq mi) and a population of 992,444 (2020). It is a part of Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture. The prefecture level city of Karamay forms a separate enclave in the middle of Tacheng.

Altay Prefecture is a prefecture in northern Xinjiang, China. It has an area of 118,015 km (45,566 sq mi) and a population of 561,667 (2000). It is a part of the Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture. As of the 2000 census, Altay was the only major subdivision of Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture with an ethnic Kazakh majority (about 51%). In 2007, it had a GDP of RMB 9.9 billion with a 12% growth rate. It also shares an international border with the neighboring Altai Republic, located within Russia.

Altay is considered the birthplace of skiing, based on 10,000 to 30,000 year old cave paintings depicting skiers.

The Ili River is a river in northwestern China and southeastern Kazakhstan. It flows from the Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region to the Almaty Region in Kazakhstan.

It is 1,439 kilometres (894 mi) long (including its source river the Tekes), 815 kilometres (506 mi) of which is in Kazakhstan. The river originates from the Tekes and Künes rivers in Eastern Tian Shan. The Ili drains the basin between the Tian Shan and the Borohoro Mountains. Flowing into Lake Balkhash (in the endorheic Balkhash-Alakol Basin), the Ili forms a large delta with vast wetland regions of lakes, marshes and vegetation.

Kazakhs in China (Chinese: 中国哈萨克族; Kazakh: جۇڭگو قازاقتارى) form the largest community of Kazakhs outside Kazakhstan. They are one of the 56 ethnic groups officially recognized by the People's Republic of China. There is one Kazakh autonomous prefecture – Ili in Xinjiang – and three Kazakh autonomous counties – Aksay in Gansu, and Barkol and Mori in Xinjiang.

Dawachi (Chinese: 達瓦齊; pinyin: Dáwǎqí; Mongolian: Даваач; died 1759) was the last ruler of the Dzungar Khanate from 1753 until his defeat at the hands of Qing and Mongol forces at Ili in 1755.

Dawachi belonged to the highest rank of Dzungar aristocracy. He traced his ancestry back directly to Erdeni Batur (died 1635), the founder of the Dzungar Khanate. His grandfather was Tsering Dondup. His brother, Tsewang Rabtan (1643-1727), led the Dzungar invasion and occupation of Tibet in 1717. His father was the second cousin of Galdan Tseren, the Khong Tayiji of the Dzungar Khanate from 1727 to 1745.