Franz Josef Land

This isolated archipelago is located on the east of Spitsbergen and consists of 191 islands, 83% of which are covered with permanent ice.  Franz Josef Land is uninhabited (by humans), but home to polar bears, walruses, seals and a tremendous variety of Arctic birds.  The islands are the most northern of Eurasia. The archipelago is only 900 to 1110 km (560 to 690 statute miles) from the North Pole, closer than all land masses except for Canada's Ellesmere Island and Greenland.
Franz Josef Land was discovered in 1873 during the Austrian-Hungarian North Pole expedition under leadership of K. Weyprecht and J. v. Payer. It was subsequently named after the former Austrian Emperor Franz-Josef I. From 1925 it came under Soviet authority, but  is nowadays controlled by the Russian government.