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Rwanda Profile |
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Quick Facts About Rwanda
Capital
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name: Kigali
geographic coordinates: 1 57 S, 30 04 E
time difference: UTC+2 (7 hours ahead of Washington, DC during Standard Time)
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Country Name
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conventional long form: Republic of Rwanda
conventional short form: Rwanda
local long form: Republika y"u Rwanda
local short form: Rwanda
former: Ruanda, German East Africa
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Dependency Status
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*
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Type of Government
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republic; presidential, multiparty system
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Background
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In 1959, three years before independence from Belgium, the majority ethnic group, the Hutus, overthrew the ruling Tutsi king. Over the next several years, thousands of Tutsis were killed, and some 150,000 driven into exile in neighboring countries. The children of these exiles later formed a rebel group, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), and began a civil war in 1990. The war, along with several political and economic upheavals, exacerbated ethnic tensions, culminating in April 1994 in the genocide of roughly 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus. The Tutsi rebels defeated the Hutu regime and ended the killing in July 1994, but approximately 2 million Hutu refugees - many fearing Tutsi retribution - fled to neighboring Burundi, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zaire. Since then, most of the refugees have returned to Rwanda, but several thousand remained in the neighboring Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC; the former Zaire) and formed an extremist insurgency bent on retaking Rwanda, much as the RPF tried in 1990. Rwanda held its first local elections in 1999 and its first post-genocide presidential and legislative elections in 2003. Rwanda in 2009 staged a joint military operation with the Congolese Army in DRC to rout out the Hutu extremist insurgency there and Kigali and Kinshasa restored diplomatic relations. Rwanda also joined the Commonwealth in late 2009.
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Branches
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Rwandan Defense Forces (RDF), Rwandan Patriotic Air Force (2009)
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Age Structure
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0-14 years: 43% (male 2,394,044/female 2,359,901)
15-64 years: 54.6% (male 3,002,661/female 3,029,722)
65 years and over: 2.4% (male 108,080/female 161,568) (2010 est.)
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Languages
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Kinyarwanda (official) universal Bantu vernacular, French (official), English (official), Kiswahili (Swahili) used in commercial centers
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Population
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11,055,976
note: estimates for this country explicitly take into account the effects of excess mortality due to AIDS; this can result in lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality, higher death rates, lower population growth rates, and changes in the distribution of population by age and sex than would otherwise be expected (July 2010 est.)
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Religions
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Roman Catholic 56.5%, Protestant 26%, Adventist 11.1%, Muslim 4.6%, indigenous beliefs 0.1%, none 1.7% (2001)
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Internet Users
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300,000 (2008)
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Area - Comparative
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slightly smaller than Maryland
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Area
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total: 26,338 sq km
land: 24,668 sq km
water: 1,670 sq km
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Terrain
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mostly grassy uplands and hills; relief is mountainous with altitude declining from west to east
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Climate
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temperate; two rainy seasons (February to April, November to January); mild in mountains with frost and snow possible
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Natural Hazards
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periodic droughts; the volcanic Virunga mountains are in the northwest along the border with Democratic Republic of the Congo
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| Rwanda |
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Source:
CIA World Factbook |
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