Iraq

Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, historically known in the west as Mesopotamia, is a country in West Asia. Located within the Middle East, it is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the south, Turkey to the north, Iran to the east, the Persian Gulf and Kuwait to the southeast, Jordan to the southwest, and Syria to the west. The country covers an area of 438,317 square kilometres (169,235 sq mi) and has a population of over 46 million, making it the 58th largest country by area and the 31st most populous in the world. Baghdad, home to over 8 million people, is the capital city and the largest in the country. Starting in the 6th millennium BC, the fertile plains between Iraq's Tigris and Euphrates rivers, referred to as Mesopotamia, fostered the rise of early cities, civilisations, and empires including Sumer, Akkad, Babylonia, and Assyria. Known as the cradle of civilisation, Mesopotamia saw the invention of astrology, mathematics, navigation, timekeeping, writing systems, the wheel, the sailboat, a calendar, and a law code. After the Arab conquest of Mesopotamia in the 7th century, Iraq became the metropole of the Abbasid Caliphate with Baghdad emerging as a global cultural and intellectual hub during the Islamic Golden Age, home to institutions such as the House of Wisdom. Following Baghdad's destruction by the Mongols in 1258, Iraq came under successive empires, and from the 16th until the 20th century, it was governed within the Ottoman system as a defined region known administratively as Ottoman Iraq. Since independence in 1932 after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I, Iraq has experienced spells of significant economic and military growth alongside periods of instability and conflict. Iraq emerged as a hashemite monarchy after centuries of Ottoman rule and a period under British administration. In...