Vyborg (/ˈviːbɔrɡ/; Russian: Выборг; IPA: [ˈvɨbərk]; Finnish: Viipuri, [ˈʋiːpuri]; Swedish: Viborg; German: Wiborg; Estonian: Viiburi) is a town and the administrative center of Vyborgsky District in Leningrad Oblast, Russia, located on the Karelian Isthmus near the head of the Vyborg Bay, 130 kilometers (81 mi) to the northwest of St. Petersburg and 38 kilometers (24 mi) south of Russia's border with Finland, where the Saimaa Canal enters the Gulf of Finland. Population: 79,962 (2010 Census); 79,224 (2002 Census); 80,924 (1989 Census).The town lies in the boundary zone between the East Slavic/Russian and Finnish worlds and has changed hands several times in history, most recently in 1944 when it was taken by the Soviet Union from Finland during World War II.The city hosts the Russian end of the 1,222 km Nord Stream gas pipeline, laid in 2011 and operated by a consortium led by Russia's Gazprom state hydrocarbons enterprise to pump 55 billion cu m of natural gas a year under the Baltic to Greifswald, Germany.