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Travel to Egypt — Unbiased reviews and
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Egypt
Arab Republic of Egypt National
name: Jumhuriyat Misr al-Arabiyah President: Hosni Mubarak (1981) Prime Minister: Ahmed Nazif
(2004)
Current government officials
Land area: 384,344 sq mi (995,451 sq km);
total area: 386,662 sq mi (1,001,450 sq km) Population (2008 est.): 81,713,517 (growth
rate: 1.6%); birth rate: 22.1/1000; infant mortality rate: 28.3/1000;
life expectancy: 71.8; density per sq km: 82
Capital and largest city (2003 est.):
Cairo, 11,146,000 (metro. area), 7,629,866 (city
proper) Other large cities:
Alexandria, 3,891,000; Giza, 2,597,600 (part of Cairo metro. area);
Shubra el Khema, 1,018,000 (part of Cairo metro. area); El Mahalla el
Kubra, 462,300 Monetary unit: Egyptian
pound
Languages:
Arabic (official), English and French widely
understood by educated classes
Ethnicity/race:
Egyptian 98%, Berber, Nubian, Bedouin, and Beja
1%, Greek, Armenian, other European (primarily Italian and French)
1%
National Holiday:
Revolution Day, July 23
Religions:
Islam (mostly Sunni) 90%, Coptic 9%, Christian
1%, other 6% Literacy rate: 71.4%
(2005 est.) Economic summary:
GDP/PPP $404 billion (2007 est.); per capita $5,500. Real
growth rate: 7.1%. Inflation: 11%. Unemployment:
9.1%. Arable land: 3%. Agriculture: cotton, rice, corn,
wheat, beans, fruits, vegetables; cattle, water buffalo, sheep, goats.
Labor force: 22.5 million (2007); agriculture 32%, industry
17%, services 51% (2001 est.). Industries: textiles, food
processing, tourism, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, hydrocarbons,
construction, cement, metals, light manufactures. Natural
resources: petroleum, natural gas, iron ore, phosphates,
manganese, limestone, gypsum, talc, asbestos, lead, zinc.
Exports: $27.42 billion f.o.b. (2007 est.): crude oil and
petroleum products, cotton, textiles, metal products, chemicals.
Imports: $40.48 billion f.o.b. (2007 est.): machinery and
equipment, foodstuffs, chemicals, wood products, fuels. Major
trading partners: Italy, U.S., Syria, Germany, Spain, France,
China, UK, Saudi Arabia (2004). Communications: Telephones: main lines in
use: 10.8 million (2006); mobile cellular: 18.001 million (2006).
Radio broadcast stations: AM 42 (plus 15 repeater stations), FM
14, shortwave 3 (1999). Television broadcast stations: 98
(Sept. 1995). Internet hosts: 5,363 (2007). Internet
users: 6 million (2006). Transportation: Railways: total: 5,063 km
(2004). Highways: total: 92,370 km; paved: 74,820 km; unpaved:
17,550 km (2004 est.). Waterways: 3,500 km; note: includes Nile
River, Lake Nasser, Alexandria-Cairo Waterway, and numerous smaller
canals in delta; Suez Canal (193.5 km including approaches) navigable
by oceangoing vessels drawing up to 17.68 m (2004). Ports and
harbors: Alexandria, Damietta, El Dekheila, Port Said, Suez, Zeit.
Airports: 88 (2007). International
disputes: Egypt and Sudan retain claims to administer the two
triangular areas that extend north and south of the 1899 Treaty
boundary along the 22nd Parallel, but have withdrawn their military
presence; Egypt is developing the Hala'ib Triangle north of the Treaty
line; since the attack on Taba and other Egyptian resort towns on the
Red Sea in October 2004, Egypt vigilantly monitors the Sinai and
borders with Israel and the Gaza Strip; Egypt does not extend domestic
asylum to some 70,000 persons who identify as Palestinians but who
largely lack UNRWA assistance and, until recently, UNHCR recognition
as refugees.
Major sources and definitions
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Geography
Egypt, at the northeast corner of Africa on the
Mediterranean Sea, is bordered on the west by Libya, on the south by the
Sudan, and on the east by the Red Sea and Israel. It is nearly one and
one-half times the size of Texas. Egypt is divided into two unequal,
extremely arid regions by the landscape's dominant feature, the
northward-flowing Nile River. The Nile starts 100 mi (161 km) south of the
Mediterranean and fans out to a sea front of 155 mi between the cities of
Alexandria and Port Said.
Government
Republic.
History
Egyptian history dates back to about 4000 B.C., when the kingdoms of upper and lower Egypt,
already highly sophisticated, were united. Egypt's golden age coincided
with the 18th and 19th dynasties (16th to 13th century B.C.), during which the empire was established.
Persia conquered Egypt in 525 B.C., Alexander
the Great subdued it in 332 B.C., and then the
dynasty of the Ptolemies ruled the land until 30 B.C., when Cleopatra, last of the line, committed
suicide and Egypt became a Roman, then Byzantine, province. Arab caliphs
ruled Egypt from 641 until 1517, when the Turks took it for their Ottoman
Empire.
Napoléon's armies occupied the country
from 1798 to 1801. In 1805, Mohammed Ali, leader of a band of Albanian
soldiers, became pasha of Egypt. After completion of the Suez Canal in
1869, the French and British took increasing interest in Egypt. British
troops occupied Egypt in 1882, and British resident agents became its
actual administrators, though it remained under nominal Turkish
sovereignty. In 1914, this fiction was ended, and Egypt became a
protectorate of Britain.
Egyptian nationalism, led by Zaghlul Pasha and
the Wafd Party, forced Britain to relinquish its claims on the country.
Egypt became an independent sovereign state on Feb. 28, 1922, with Fu'ad I
as its king. In 1936, by an Anglo-Egyptian treaty of alliance, all British
troops and officials were to be withdrawn, except from the Suez Canal
Zone. When World War II started, Egypt remained neutral.
When Israel declared independence in 1948, Egypt
and other Arab countries attacked; by 1949, however, Israel had rebuffed
them.
Tensions grew between the Wafd Party and the
monarchy following independence, and in 1952, the army, led by Gen.
Mohammed Naguib, seized power. Three days later, King Farouk abdicated in
favor of his infant son. The monarchy was abolished and a republic
proclaimed on June 18, 1953, with Naguib becoming president and prime
minister. He relinquished the prime ministership in 1954 to Gamal Abdel
Nasser, leader of the ruling military junta. Nasser also assumed the
presidency in 1956.
Nasser's policies embroiled his country in
continual conflict. In 1956, the U.S. and Britain withdrew their pledges
of financial aid for the building of the Aswan High Dam. In response,
Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal and expelled British oil and embassy
officials. The Soviet Union then agreed to finance the dam and would come
to exert increasing influence over Egypt in the coming decade. Israel,
barred from the canal and exasperated by terrorist raids, invaded the Gaza
Strip and the Sinai Peninsula. Britain and France, after demanding
Egyptian evacuation of the canal zone, attacked Egypt on Oct. 31, 1956.
Worldwide pressure forced Britain, France, and Israel to halt the
hostilities. A UN emergency force occupied the canal zone, and all troops
were evacuated in the spring of 1957.
From 1956 to 1961, Egypt and Syria united to
form a single country called the United Arab Republic (UAR). Syria ended
this relationship in 1961 after a military coup, but Egypt continued to
call itself the UAR until 1971.
In 1967, border tensions between Egypt and
Israel led to the Six-Day War. On June 5, Israel launched an air assault,
and within days had annexed the Sinai Peninsula, the East Bank of the
Jordan River, and the Golan Heights. A UN cease-fire on June 10 saved the
Arabs from complete rout. Nasser declared the 1967 cease-fire void along
the canal in April 1969 and began a war of attrition. On Sept. 28, 1970,
Nasser died of a heart attack. Anwar el-Sadat, an associate of Nasser and
a former newspaper editor, became the next president.
In July 1972, Sadat ordered the expulsion of
Soviet “advisers and experts” from Egypt because the Russians
had not provided the sophisticated weapons he felt were needed to retake
territory lost to Israel in 1967.
The fourth Arab-Israeli War broke out on Oct. 6,
1973, during the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur. Egypt swept deep into the
Sinai, while Syria strove to throw Israel off the Golan Heights. A
UN-sponsored truce was accepted on Oct. 22. In Jan. 1974, both sides
agreed to a settlement negotiated by the U.S. that gave Egypt a narrow
strip along the entire Sinai bank of the Suez Canal. In June, President
Nixon made the first visit by a U.S. president to Egypt and full
diplomatic relations were established. The Suez Canal was reopened on June
5, 1975.
In the most audacious act of his career, Sadat
flew to Jerusalem at the invitation of Prime Minister Menachem Begin on
Nov. 20, 1977, to discuss a permanent peace settlement. The Arab world
reacted with fury. Egypt and Israel signed a formal peace treaty on March
26, 1979. The pact ended 30 years of war and established diplomatic and
commercial relations.
By mid-1980, two-thirds of the Sinai had been
transferred back to Egypt, but Sadat halted further talks with Israel in
Aug. 1980 because of continued Israeli settlement of the West Bank. On
Oct. 6, 1981, Sadat was assassinated by extremist Muslim soldiers at a
parade in Cairo. Vice President Hosni Mubarak, a former air force chief of
staff, succeeded him. Israel completed the return of the Sinai to Egyptian
control on April 25, 1982. Israel's invasion of Lebanon in June brought a
marked cooling in Egyptian-Israeli relations, but not a disavowal of the
peace treaty.
The government has concentrated much of its time
and attention in recent years on combating Islamic extremists, who have in
particular targeted Copts (Egyptian Christians). In 1997, a terrorist
attack on foreign tourists killed 70. During the 1990s, about 26,000
Islamic militants were imprisoned and dozens were executed.
Egypt and Sudan resumed diplomatic relations in
March 2000, which broke off in 1995 after Egypt accused Sudan of
attempting to assassinate Hosni Mubarak. Human rights activists have
increased their criticism of Egypt for its heavy-handed crack down on
potentially disruptive Islamic groups, and for the harassment of
intellectuals advocating greater democracy.
At least 90 people died in a series of car-bomb
explosions at popular Red Sea resort Sharm el Sheik in July 2005. Two
militant groups claimed responsibility.
In July 2005, President Mubarak announced he
would seek a fifth six-year term. Earlier in the year Mubarak had amended
the constitution to allow for multiparty elections, the first in Egyptian
history, and on Sept. 6, Mubarak was reelected with 88.6% of the vote.
Turnout was 23%.
In Feb. 2006, an Egyptian ferry overturned in
the Red Sea. More than 1,000 people died in the disaster.
In March 2007, voters overwhelmingly endorsed
changes to the Constitution that strengthen the presidency. Voter turnout
was low, at about 27%, and opposition groups claimed the vote was
rigged.
See also Encyclopedia: Egypt. U.S. State Dept. Country Notes:
Egypt
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Education, Inc. All rights reserved.
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