Algeria

Algeria i/ælˈdʒɪəriə/ (Arabic: الجزائر‎, al-Jazā'ir; French: Algérie), officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria (الجمهورية الجزائرية الديمقراطية الشعبية, Al-Jumhūriyyah Al-Jazāʾiriyyah Ad-Dīmuqrāṭiyyah Ash-Shaʿbiyyah; French: République algérienne démocratique et populaire), also formally referred to as the Democratic and Popular Algerian Republic, is an Arab country in the Maghreb region of Africa. Its capital (and most populous city) is Algiers.

The territory of today's Algeria was the home of many ancient cultures, including Aterian and Capsian cultures. Its area have been ruled by many empires and dynasties, including ancient Numidians, Carthaginians, Romans, Vandals, Byzantines, Arab Umayyads and Fatimids, and Berber Almohads and later Turkish Ottomans.

Algeria is a semi presidential republic consisting of 48 provinces and 1541 communes. With a population exceeding 37 million, it is the 34th most populated country on earth. Its economy is oil based, suffering from Dutch disease. Sonatrach, the national oil company, is the largest company in Africa. Algeria has the second largest army in Africa and in the arab world, after Egypt, and has Russia and China as strategic allies, and arms furnisher.

With a total area of 2,381,741 square kilometres (919,595 sq mi), Algeria is the tenth-largest country in the world and the largest in Africa, after the secession of South Sudan on the 9th of July 2011 from Sudan, the latter being the former biggest country in Africa. The country is bordered in the northeast by Tunisia, in the east by Libya, in the west by Morocco, in the southwest by Western Sahara, Mauritania, and Mali, in the southeast by Niger, and in the north by the Mediterranean Sea. As of 2012, Algeria has an estimated population of 37.1 million. Algeria is a member of the African Union, the Arab League, OPEC and the United Nations, and is a founding member of the Arab Maghreb Union.