Kutchino, a small village 100 kms north-east of Perm, was the site of the harshest imaginable Soviet prison (GULAG) camp during the long period of communist ruling: "PERM-36". The 'reformatory' camp was build under Joseph Stalin in 1946 initially functioned as a timber production camp - to produce the timber that was needed to make the destruction of the World War II undone. However, 1972 was the year in which the government converted the camp into the primary place of imprisonment for people charged with political crimes. The GULAG, that showed many simularities with former Nazi-camps, differed from most other camps in Russia because of its extremely severe regime. Only the most 'dangerous' otherwise-minded were kept in Perm-36: opponents of the communist government, authors and distributors of anti-communist literature, the USSR's most prominent dissidents, anti-national organisation's leaders, advocates for human rights and other kinds of "enemies of the state". Perm-36 was one of the last ones in the Soviet Union to keep political prisoners as it only closed in December 1987.
Nowadays, the camp the only one of its kind that remained in Russia - other camps were carefully destroyed with the fall of the communist regime. The site and the facilities of the camp are now occupied by the Museum of the history of political repression "Perm-36", which functions as a vivid reminder of communist terror. All unique buildings at the camp (living huts, cells, the punishment cell, the inner-camp prison and the remains of the fences) were either preserved or have been restored.