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President: Bashar al-Assad (2000)
Prime Minister: Muhammad Naji al-Otari (2003)

Land area: 71,062 sq mi (184,051 sq km); total area: 71,498 sq mi (sq km)
Population (2006 est.): 18,881,361 (growth rate: 2.3%); birth rate: 27.8/1000; infant mortality rate: 28.6/1000; life expectancy: 70.3; density per sq mi: 266
Capital (2003 est.): Damascus, 2,381,800 (metro. area), 1,861,900

Largest cities: Aleppo, 2,492,100 (metro. area), 1,933,700 (city proper); Homs, 751,500; Latakia, 417,100; Hama, 380,200
Monetary unit: Syrian pound

Languages: Arabic (official); Kurdish, Armenian, Aramaic, Circassian widely understood; French, English somewhat understood

Ethnicity/race: Arab 90.3%, Kurds, Armenians, and other 9.7%

Religions: Islam (Sunni) 74%; Alawite, Druze, and other Islamic sects 16%; Christian (various sects) 10%; Jewish (tiny communities in Damascus, Al Qamishli, and Aleppo)
Literacy rate: 77% (2003 est.)

Economic summary: GDP/PPP (2005 est.): $63.31 billion; per capita $3,400. Real growth rate: 4.5%. Inflation: 2.6%. Unemployment: 12.3% (2004 est.).
Arable land: 25%. Agriculture: wheat, barley, cotton, lentils, chickpeas, olives, sugar beets; beef, mutton, eggs, poultry, milk. Labor force: 5.12 million (2004 est.); agriculture 30%, industry 27%, services 43% (2002 est.).
Industries: petroleum, textiles, food processing, beverages, tobacco, phosphate rock mining.
Natural resources: petroleum, phosphates, chrome and manganese ores, asphalt, iron ore, rock salt, marble, gypsum, hydropower. Exports: $6.344 billion f.o.b. (2005 est.): crude oil, petroleum products, fruits and vegetables, cotton fiber, clothing, meat and live animals, wheat.
Imports: $5.973 billion f.o.b. (2005 est.): machinery and transport equipment, electric power machinery, food and livestock, metal and metal products, chemicals and chemical products, plastics, yarn, paper. Major trading partners: Italy, France, Turkey, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Ukraine, China, Russia, U.S., South Korea (2004).

Communications: Telephones: main lines in use: 1.313 million (1997); mobile cellular: n.a. Radio

broadcast stations: AM 14, FM 2, shortwave 1 (1998). Radios: 4.15 million (1997). Television broadcast stations: 44 (plus 17 repeaters) (1995). Televisions: 1.05 million (1997). Internet Service Providers (ISPs): 1 (2000). Internet users: 60,000 (2002).
Transportation: Railways: total: 2,743 km (2002). Highways: total: 43,381 km; paved: 10,021 km (including 877 km of expressways); unpaved: 33,360 km (1999). Waterways: 870 km; minimal economic importance. Ports and harbors: Baniyas, Jablah, Latakia, Tartus. Airports: 92 (2002).

International disputes: Golan Heights is Israeli-occupied; Lebanon claims Shaba'a farms in Golan Heights; Syrian troops have been stationed in Lebanon since October 1976; Syria protests Turkish hydrological projects regulating upper Euphrates waters; Turkey is quick to rebuff any perceived Syrian claim to Hatay province.

Geography

Slightly larger than North Dakota, Syria lies at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea. It is bordered by Lebanon and Israel on the west, Turkey on the north, Iraq on the east, and Jordan on the south. Coastal Syria is a narrow plain, in back of which is a range of coastal mountains, and still farther inland a steppe area. In the east is the Syrian Desert and in the south is the Jebel. The highest point in Syria is Mount Hermon (9,232 ft; 2,814 m) on the Lebanese border. Druze Range

Republic under a military regime since March 1963.

History

Ancient Syria was conquered by Egypt about 1500 B.C., and after that by Hebrews, Assyrians, Chaldeans, Persians, and Alexander the Great of Macedonia. From 64 B.C. until the Arab conquest in A.D. 636, it was part of the Roman Empire except during brief periods. The Arabs made it a trade center for their extensive empire, but it suffered severely from the Mongol invasion in 1260 and fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1516. Syria remained a Turkish province until World War I.

A secret Anglo-French pact of 1916 put Syria in the French zone of influence. The League of Nations gave France a mandate over Syria after World War I, but the French were forced to put down several nationalist uprisings. In 1930, France recognized Syria as an independent republic but still subject to the mandate. After nationalist demonstrations in 1939, the French high commissioner suspended the Syrian constitution. In 1941, British and Free French forces invaded Syria to eliminate Vichy control. During the rest of World War II, Syria was an Allied base. Again in 1945, nationalist demonstrations broke into actual fighting, and British troops had to restore order. Syrian forces met a series of reverses while participating in the Arab invasion of Palestine in 1948. In 1958, Egypt and Syria formed the United Arab Republic, with Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt as president. However, Syria became independent again on Sept. 29, 1961, following a revolution.

In the Arab-Israeli War of 1967, Israel quickly vanquished the Syrian army. Before acceding to the UN cease-fire, the Israeli forces took control of the fortified Golan Heights. Syria joined Egypt in attacking Israel in Oct. 1973 in the fourth Arab-Israeli War, but was pushed back from initial successes on the Golan Heights and ended up losing more land. However, in the settlement worked out by U.S. secretary of state Henry A. Kissinger in 1974, the Syrians recovered all the territory lost in 1973.

In the mid-1970s Syria sent some 20,000 troops to support Muslim Lebanese in their armed conflict with Christian militants supported by Israel during the civil war in Lebanon. Syrian troops frequently clashed with Israeli troops during Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon and remained thereafter as occupiers of large portions of Lebanon.

In 1990, President Assad ruled out any possibility of legalizing opposition political parties. In Dec. 1991 voters approved a fourth term for Assad, giving him 99.98% of the vote.

In the 1990s, the slowdown in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process was echoed in the lack of progress in Israeli-Syrian relations. Confronted with a steadily strengthening strategic partnership between Israel and Turkey, Syria took steps to construct a countervailing alliance by improving relations with Iraq, strengthening ties with Iran, and collaborating more closely with Saudi Arabia. In Dec. 1999, Israeli-Syrian talks resumed after a nearly four-year hiatus, but they soon broke down over discussions about the Golan Heights.

On June 10, 2000, President Hafez al-Assad died. He had ruled with an iron fist since taking power in a military coup in 1970. His son, Bashar al-Assad, an ophthalmologist by training, succeeded him. He has emulated his father's autocratic rule.

In the summer of 2001, Syria withdrew nearly all of its 25,000 troops from Beirut. Syrian soldiers, however, remained in the Lebanese countryside.

The U.S. imposed economic sanctions on the country in May, accusing it of continuing to support terrorism.

In Sept. 2004, a UN Security Council resolution asked Syria to withdraw its 15,000 remaining troops from Lebanon. Syria responded by moving about 3,000 troops from the vicinity of Beirut to eastern Lebanon, a gesture viewed by many as merely cosmetic.
On Feb. 14, 2004, Lebanon's former prime minister Rafik Hariri was assassinated. Many implicated Syria in the death of the popular and independent leader, who staunchly opposed Syrian involvement in Lebanon. Huge Lebanese protests called for Syria's withdrawal from the country, a demand backed by the U.S., EU, and UN. In addition to the anti-Syrian demonstrations. By the end of April, Syria had withdrawn all its troops, ending a 29-year occupation. In October

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