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Middle East

(Encyclopedia)Middle East, term traditionally applied by western Europeans to the countries of SW Asia and NE Africa lying W of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India. Thus defined it includes Cyprus, the Asian part of T...

Ogaden

(Encyclopedia)Ogaden ōgäˈdān [key], region, SE Ethiopia, bordering on Somalia. It is an arid region, inhabited mainly by Somali pastoral nomads. The region was conquered by Menelik II of Ethiopia in 1891. A cla...

Agadez

(Encyclopedia)Agadez ägädĕsˈ [key], town, W central Niger, in the Aïr Massif. Agadez is a trade center visited by Tuareg pastoral nomads. Leather and silver handicrafts are ...

Arab League

(Encyclopedia)Arab League, popular name for the League of Arab States, formed in 1945 in an attempt to give political expression to the Arab nations. The original charter members were Egypt, Iraq, Jordan (then know...

Chad

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Chad chăd, chäd [key], officially Republic of Chad, republic (2020 est. pop. 16,425,864), ...

Victor Emmanuel III

(Encyclopedia)Victor Emmanuel III, 1869–1947, king of Italy (1900–1946), emperor of Ethiopia (1936–43), king of Albania (1939–43), son and successor of Humbert I. In 1896 he married Princess Helena of Monte...

Rommel, Erwin

(Encyclopedia)Rommel, Erwin ĕrˈvēn rômˈəl [key], 1891–1944, German field marshal. He entered the army in 1910 and rose slowly through the ranks. In 1939, Adolf Hitler made him a general. Rommel brilliantly ...

Third World

(Encyclopedia)Third World, the technologically less advanced, or developing, nations of Asia, Africa, and Latin America, generally characterized as poor, having economies distorted by their dependence on the export...

Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries

(Encyclopedia)Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), multinational organization (est. 1960, formally constituted 1961) that coordinates petroleum policies and economic aid among oil-producing nations...

Bassiouni, M. Cherif

(Encyclopedia)Bassiouni, M. Cherif (Mahmoud Cherif Bassiouni), 1937–2017, Egyptian-American international criminal law jurist and human-rights advocate, b. Cairo. Bassiouni fought for Egypt in the Suez conflict (...