Statistics

President: Charles Taylor (1997)

Area: 43,000 sq mi (111,370 sq km)

Population (2001 est.): 3,225,837 (average annual rate of natural increase: 3.0%); birth rate: 46.6/1000; infant mortality rate: 132.4/1000; density per sq mi: 75

Capital and largest city (1993 est.): Monrovia, 1,000,000

Monetary unit: Liberian dollar

Languages: English (official) and tribal dialects

Ethnicity/race: indigenous African tribes 95% (including Kpelle, Bassa, Gio, Kru, Grebo, Mano, Krahn, Gola, Gbandi, Loma, Kissi, Vai, and Bella), Americo-Liberians 5% (descendants of former slaves)

Religions: traditional 70%, Christian 10%, Islam 20%

Literacy rate: 40% (1990)

Economic summary: GDP/PPP (1999 est.): $2.85 billion; per capita $1,000. Real growth rate: 0.5%. Inflation: 3% (1998 est.). Unemployment: 70%. Arable land: 1%. Agriculture: rubber, coffee, cocoa, rice, cassava (tapioca), palm oil, sugarcane, bananas; sheep, goats; timber. Labor force: agriculture, 70%; industry, 8%; services, 22% (1999 est.). Industries: rubber processing, palm oil processing, diamonds. Natural resources: iron ore, timber, diamonds, gold, hydropower. Exports: $39 million (f.o.b., 1998 est.): diamonds, iron ore, rubber, timber, coffee, cocoa. Imports: $142 million (f.o.b., 1998 est.): fuels, chemicals, machinery, transportation equipment, manufactured goods; rice and other foodstuffs. Major trading partners: Benelux, Norway, Ukraine, Singapore, South Korea, Japan, Italy.

Communications: Telephones: main lines in use: 5,000 (1995); mobile cellular: 0 (1995). Radio broadcast stations: AM 0, FM 6, shortwave 4 (1999). Radios: 790,000 (1997). Television broadcast stations: 2 (plus four low-power repeaters) (2000). Televisions: 70,000 (1997). Internet Service Providers (ISPs): n.a.

Transportation: Railways: total: 490 km (328 km single track); note: three rail systems owned and operated by foreign steel and financial interests in conjunction with the Liberian Government; one of these, the Lamco Railroad, closed in 1989 after iron ore production ceased; the other two were shut down by the civil war; large sections of the rail lines have been dismantled; approximately 60 km of railroad track was exported for scrap. Highways: total: 10,600 km (there is major deterioration on all highways due to heavy rains and lack of maintenance) paved: 657 km; unpaved: 9,943 km (1996 est.). Ports and harbors: Buchanan, Greenville, Harper, Monrovia. Airports: 45 (1999 est.).

International disputes: none.

Geography

Lying on the Atlantic in the southern part of West Africa, Liberia is bordered by Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Côte d'Ivoire. It is comparable in size to Tennessee.

Most of the country is a plateau covered by dense tropical forests, which thrive under an annual rainfall of about 160 inches a year.

Republic.

Africa's first republic, Liberia was founded in 1822 as a result of the efforts of the American Colonization Society to settle freed American slaves in West Africa. The society contended that the immigration of blacks to Africa was an answer to the problem of slavery as well as to what it felt was the incompatibility of the races. Over the course of forty years, about 12,000 slaves were voluntarily relocated. Originally called Monrovia, the colony became the Free and Independent Republic of Liberia in 1847.

The English-speaking Americo-Liberians, descendants of former American slaves, make up only 5% of the population, but have historically dominated the intellectual and ruling class. Liberia's indigenous population is primarily composed of Mande, Kwa, and Mel peoples.

The government of Africa's first republic was modeled after that of the United States, and Joseph Jenkins Roberts of Virginia was elected the first president. Ironically, Liberia's constitution denied indigenous Liberians equal rights with the lighter-skinned American emigrants and their descendants.

After 1920, considerable progress was made toward opening up the interior, a process that was spurred in 1951 by the establishment of a 43-mile (69-km) railroad to the Bomi Hills from Monrovia. In July 1971, while serving his sixth term as president, William V. S. Tubman died following surgery and was succeeded by his long-time associate, Vice President William R. Tolbert, Jr.

Tolbert was ousted in a military coup carried out April 12, 1980, by Master Sgt. Samuel K. Doe, who was backed by the U.S. government. A rebellion led by Charles Taylor, a former Doe aide, started in Dec. 1989 and, with the help of Côte d'Ivoire and Burkina Faso, took control of Liberia's key population and economic centers by mid-July 1990. His three attempts to take the capital failed, however, and the bloody civil war continued. By mid-April 1996 factional fighting by the country's warlords had destroyed any last vestige of normalcy and civil society.

In what was considered by international observers to be a free election, Charles Taylor won 75.3% of the presidential vote in July 1997. Since then, however, Taylor's government has focused more on armed security rather than reconstruction of the country after its seven-year civil war. While Taylor attempts to fashion himself into a democratic political leader, his behavior remains that of a militia rebel. Heavy fighting continued during the summer of 2000, destabilizing northern Liberia. Taylor charged neighboring Guinea with aiding the rebels, who were operating from within Guinean territory. Meanwhile, in July 2000 Great Britain threatened Liberia with sanctions for supporting rebels fighting in Sierra Leone.

See Also: Republic of Liberia http://www.liberia.net

(Source: www.infoplease.com )

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