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Bessarabia (Basarabia in Romanian, Бесарабія in Ukrainian, Бессарабия in Russian, Бесарабия in Bulgarian, Besarabya in Turkish) is a historical term for the geographic entity in Eastern Europe bounded by the Dniester River on the East and the Prut River on the West. This was the name by which Imperial Russia designated the eastern part of the principality of Moldavia ceded by the Ottoman Empire to Russia in the aftermath of the Russo-Turkish War, 1806-1812. The remaining Moldavia united with Wallachia in 1859 in what would become the Kingdom of Romania. In 1918, Bessarabia declared its independence from Russia and at the end of World War I, it united with the Kingdom of Romania. The USSR annexed Bessarabia in the beginning of World War II (see Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact) and again at the end of World War II, and reorganised it as the Moldavian SSR, by adding the Moldavian ASSR and transferring its southern and northern parts to the Ukrainian SSR. In 1991 the Moldavian SSR declared independence from the USSR as the Republic of Moldova.