1.
Chinese language
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Chinese is a group of related, but in many cases mutually unintelligible, language varieties, forming a branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family. Chinese is spoken by the Han majority and many ethnic groups in China. Nearly 1.2 billion people speak some form of Chinese as their first language, the varieties of Chinese are usually described by native speakers as dialects of a single Chinese language, but linguists note that they are as diverse as a language family. The internal diversity of Chinese has been likened to that of the Romance languages, There are between 7 and 13 main regional groups of Chinese, of which the most spoken by far is Mandarin, followed by Wu, Min, and Yue. Most of these groups are mutually unintelligible, although some, like Xiang and certain Southwest Mandarin dialects, may share common terms, all varieties of Chinese are tonal and analytic. Standard Chinese is a form of spoken Chinese based on the Beijing dialect of Mandarin. It is the language of China and Taiwan, as well as one of four official languages of Singapore. It is one of the six languages of the United Nations. The written form of the language, based on the logograms known as Chinese characters, is shared by literate speakers of otherwise unintelligible dialects. Of the other varieties of Chinese, Cantonese is the spoken language and official in Hong Kong and Macau. It is also influential in Guangdong province and much of Guangxi, dialects of Southern Min, part of the Min group, are widely spoken in southern Fujian, with notable variants also spoken in neighboring Taiwan and in Southeast Asia. Hakka also has a diaspora in Taiwan and southeast Asia. Shanghainese and other Wu varieties are prominent in the lower Yangtze region of eastern China, Chinese can be traced back to a hypothetical Sino-Tibetan proto-language. The first written records appeared over 3,000 years ago during the Shang dynasty, as the language evolved over this period, the various local varieties became mutually unintelligible. In reaction, central governments have sought to promulgate a unified standard. Difficulties have included the great diversity of the languages, the lack of inflection in many of them, in addition, many of the smaller languages are spoken in mountainous areas that are difficult to reach, and are often also sensitive border zones. Without a secure reconstruction of proto-Sino-Tibetan, the structure of the family remains unclear. A top-level branching into Chinese and Tibeto-Burman languages is often assumed, the earliest examples of Chinese are divinatory inscriptions on oracle bones from around 1250 BCE in the late Shang dynasty
2.
Japanese language
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Japanese is an East Asian language spoken by about 125 million speakers, primarily in Japan, where it is the national language. It is a member of the Japonic language family, whose relation to language groups, particularly to Korean. Little is known of the prehistory, or when it first appeared in Japan. Chinese documents from the 3rd century recorded a few Japanese words, during the Heian period, Chinese had considerable influence on the vocabulary and phonology of Old Japanese. Late Middle Japanese saw changes in features that brought it closer to the modern language, the standard dialect moved from the Kansai region to the Edo region in the Early Modern Japanese period. Following the end in 1853 of Japans self-imposed isolation, the flow of loanwords from European languages increased significantly, English loanwords in particular have become frequent, and Japanese words from English roots have proliferated. Japanese is an agglutinative, mora-timed language with simple phonotactics, a vowel system, phonemic vowel and consonant length. Word order is normally subject–object–verb with particles marking the grammatical function of words, sentence-final particles are used to add emotional or emphatic impact, or make questions. Nouns have no number or gender, and there are no articles. Verbs are conjugated, primarily for tense and voice, but not person, Japanese equivalents of adjectives are also conjugated. Japanese has a system of honorifics with verb forms and vocabulary to indicate the relative status of the speaker, the listener. Japanese has no relationship with Chinese, but it makes extensive use of Chinese characters, or kanji, in its writing system. Along with kanji, the Japanese writing system uses two syllabic scripts, hiragana and katakana. Latin script is used in a fashion, such as for imported acronyms. Very little is known about the Japanese of this period, Old Japanese is the oldest attested stage of the Japanese language. Through the spread of Buddhism, the Chinese writing system was imported to Japan, the earliest texts found in Japan are written in Classical Chinese, but they may have been meant to be read as Japanese by the kanbun method. Some of these Chinese texts show the influences of Japanese grammar, in these hybrid texts, Chinese characters are also occasionally used phonetically to represent Japanese particles. The earliest text, the Kojiki, dates to the early 8th century, the end of Old Japanese coincides with the end of the Nara period in 794
3.
Korean language
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It is also one of the two official languages in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture and Changbai Korean Autonomous County of the Peoples Republic of China. Approximately 80 million people worldwide speak Korean and this implies that Korean is not an isolate, but a member of a small family. There is still debate on whether Korean and Japanese are related with each other, the Korean language is agglutinative in its morphology and SOV in its syntax. A relation of Korean with Japonic languages has been proposed by linguists like William George Aston, Chinese characters arrived in Korea together with Buddhism during the pre-Three Kingdoms period. Mainly privileged elites were educated to read and write in hanja, however, today, the hanja are largely unused in everyday life, but in South Korea they experience revivals on artistic works and are important in historic and/or linguistic studies of Korean. Since the Korean War, through 70 years of separation, North–South differences have developed in standard Korean, including variations in pronunciation, verb inflection, the Korean names for the language are based on the names for Korea used in North Korea and South Korea. In South Korea, the Korean language is referred to by names including hanguk-eo Korean language, hanguk-mal, Korean speech and uri-mal. In hanguk-eo and hanguk-mal, the first part of the word, hanguk, refers to the Korean nation while -eo and -mal mean language and speech, Korean is also simply referred to as guk-eo, literally national language. This name is based on the same Chinese characters meaning nation + language that are used in Taiwan and Japan to refer to their respective national languages. In North Korea and China, the language is most often called Chosŏn-mal, or more formally, the English word Korean is derived from Goryeo, which is thought to be the first dynasty known to Western countries. Korean people in the former USSR refer to themselves as Koryo-saram and Goryeo In, the majority of historical and modern linguists classify Korean as a language isolate. Such factors of typological divergence as Middle Mongolians exhibition of gender agreement can be used to argue that a relationship with Altaic is unlikely. Sergei Anatolyevich Starostin found about 25% of potential cognates in the Japanese–Korean 100-word Swadesh list, a good example might be Middle Korean sàm and Japanese asa, meaning hemp. Also, the doublet wo meaning hemp is attested in Western Old Japanese and it is thus plausible to assume a borrowed term. Among ancient languages, various relatives of Korean have been proposed. Some classify the language of Jeju Island as a distinct modern Koreanic language, Other famous theories are the Dravido-Korean languages theory and the mostly unknown southern-theory which suggest an Austronesian relation. Korean is spoken by the Korean people in North Korea and South Korea and by the Korean diaspora in countries including the Peoples Republic of China, the United States, Japan. Korean-speaking minorities exist in these states, but because of cultural assimilation into host countries, Korean is the official language of South Korea and North Korea
4.
Russian language
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Russian is an East Slavic language and an official language in Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and many minor or unrecognised territories. Russian belongs to the family of Indo-European languages and is one of the four living members of the East Slavic languages, written examples of Old East Slavonic are attested from the 10th century and beyond. It is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia and the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages and it is also the largest native language in Europe, with 144 million native speakers in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Russian is the eighth most spoken language in the world by number of native speakers, the language is one of the six official languages of the United Nations. Russian is also the second most widespread language on the Internet after English, Russian distinguishes between consonant phonemes with palatal secondary articulation and those without, the so-called soft and hard sounds. This distinction is found between pairs of almost all consonants and is one of the most distinguishing features of the language, another important aspect is the reduction of unstressed vowels. Russian is a Slavic language of the Indo-European family and it is a lineal descendant of the language used in Kievan Rus. From the point of view of the language, its closest relatives are Ukrainian, Belarusian, and Rusyn. An East Slavic Old Novgorod dialect, although vanished during the 15th or 16th century, is considered to have played a significant role in the formation of modern Russian. In the 19th century, the language was often called Great Russian to distinguish it from Belarusian, then called White Russian and Ukrainian, however, the East Slavic forms have tended to be used exclusively in the various dialects that are experiencing a rapid decline. In some cases, both the East Slavic and the Church Slavonic forms are in use, with different meanings. For details, see Russian phonology and History of the Russian language and it is also regarded by the United States Intelligence Community as a hard target language, due to both its difficulty to master for English speakers and its critical role in American world policy. The standard form of Russian is generally regarded as the modern Russian literary language, mikhail Lomonosov first compiled a normalizing grammar book in 1755, in 1783 the Russian Academys first explanatory Russian dictionary appeared. By the mid-20th century, such dialects were forced out with the introduction of the education system that was established by the Soviet government. Despite the formalization of Standard Russian, some nonstandard dialectal features are observed in colloquial speech. Thus, the Russian language is the 6th largest in the world by number of speakers, after English, Mandarin, Hindi/Urdu, Spanish, Russian is one of the six official languages of the United Nations. Education in Russian is still a choice for both Russian as a second language and native speakers in Russia as well as many of the former Soviet republics. Russian is still seen as an important language for children to learn in most of the former Soviet republics, samuel P. Huntington wrote in the Clash of Civilizations, During the heyday of the Soviet Union, Russian was the lingua franca from Prague to Hanoi
5.
Indonesian language
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Indonesian is the official language of Indonesia. It is a register of Malay, an Austronesian language that has been used as a lingua franca in the multilingual Indonesian archipelago for centuries. Indonesia is the fourth most populous nation in the world, of its large population, the majority speak Indonesian, making it one of the most widely spoken languages in the world. However, most formal education, and nearly all national mass media, governance, administration, judiciary, the Indonesian name for the language is Bahasa Indonesia or sometimes simplified as Bahasa. This term is occasionally found in English and other languages. Indonesian is a register of Riau Malay, which despite its common name is not the Malay dialect native to Riau. Originally spoken in Northeast Sumatra, Malay has been used as a lingua franca in the Indonesian archipelago for half a millennium and it might be attributed to its ancestor, the Old Malay language. The Kedukan Bukit Inscription is the oldest surviving specimen of Old Malay, trade contacts carried on by various ethnic peoples at the time were the main vehicle for spreading the Old Malay language, which was the main communications medium among the traders. Ultimately, the Old Malay language became a lingua franca and was spoken widely by most people in the archipelago, Indonesian is essentially the same language as the official Malaysian, Singaporean and Brunei standards of Malay. However, it does differ from Malaysian in several respects, with differences in pronunciation and these differences are due mainly to the Dutch and Javanese influences on Indonesian. Indonesian was also influenced by the Melayu pasar, which was the lingua franca of the archipelago in colonial times, and thus indirectly by other spoken languages of the islands. Malaysian Malay claims to be closer to the classical Malay of earlier centuries, even though modern Malaysian has been influenced, in lexicon as well as in syntax. The question of whether High Malay or Low Malay was the parent of the Indonesian language is still in debate. Some linguists have argued that it was the more common Low Malay that formed the base of the Indonesian language, however, the language had never been dominant among the population of the Indonesian archipelago as it was limited to mercantile activity. The VOC adopted the Malay language as the language of their trading outpost in the east. Following the bankruptcy of the VOC the Dutch crown took control of the colony in 1799 and it was then that education in. Even then, Dutch administrators were reluctant to promote the use of Dutch compared to other colonial regimes. Dutch thus remained the language of a elite, in 1940
6.
Malay language
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Malay is a major language of the Austronesian family. It has a status in Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia. As the Bahasa Kebangsaan or Bahasa Nasional of several states, Standard Malay has various official names, in Singapore and Brunei it is called Bahasa Melayu, in Malaysia, Bahasa Malaysia, and in Indonesia, Bahasa Indonesia and is designated the Bahasa Persatuan/Pemersatu. However, in areas of central to southern Sumatra where the language is indigenous, Indonesians refer to it as Bahasa Melayu and consider it one of their regional languages. There are also several Malay trade and creole languages which are based on a lingua franca derived from Classical Malay, as well as Macassar Malay, Malay historical linguists agree on the likelihood of the Malay homeland being in western Borneo stretching to the Bruneian coast. A form known as Proto-Malay language was spoken in Borneo at least by 1000 BCE and was, it has been argued, the ancestral language of all subsequent Malayan languages. The history of the Malay language can be divided into five periods, Old Malay, the Transitional Period, the Malacca Period, Late Modern Malay and it is not clear that Old Malay was actually the ancestor of Classical Malay, but this is thought to be quite possible. Old Malay was influenced by Sanskrit literary language of Classical India, Sanskrit loanwords can be found in Old Malay vocabulary. Batenburg on November 29,1920 at Kedukan Bukit, South Sumatra, on the banks of the Tatang and it is a small stone of 45 by 80 centimetres. The earliest surviving manuscript in Malay is the Tanjong Tanah Law in post-Pallava letters and this 14th-century pre-Islamic legal text produced in the Adityawarman era of Dharmasraya, a Hindu-Buddhist kingdom that arose after the end of Srivijayan rule in Sumatra. The laws were for the Minangkabau people, who still live in the highlands of Sumatra. The Malay language came into use as the lingua franca of the Malacca Sultanate. During this period, the Malay language developed rapidly under the influence of Islamic literature, the development changed the nature of the language with massive infusion of Arabic, Malayalam and Sanskrit vocabularies, called Classical Malay. Under the Sultanate of Malacca the language evolved into a form recognisable to speakers of modern Malay, however, there is no connection between Malaccan Malay as used on Riau and the Riau vernacular. One of the oldest surviving letters written in Malay is a letter from Sultan Abu Hayat of Ternate, Maluku Islands in present-day Indonesia, the letter is addressed to the king of Portugal, following contact with Portuguese explorer Francisco Serrão. The letters show sign of non-native usage, the Ternateans used the unrelated Ternate language, Malay was used solely as a lingua franca for inter-ethnic communications. Malay is a member of the Austronesian family of languages, which includes languages from Southeast Asia, malagasy, a geographic outlier spoken in Madagascar in the Indian Ocean, is also a member of this language family. Although each language of the family is mutually unintelligible, their similarities are rather striking, many roots have come virtually unchanged from their common ancestor, Proto-Austronesian language
7.
Filipino language
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Filipino /ˌfɪlɪˈpiːnoʊ/, in this usage, refers to the national language of the Philippines. Filipino is also designated, along with English, as a language of the country. It is the register of the Tagalog language, an Austronesian. As of 2007, Tagalog is the first language of 28 million people, or about one-third of the Philippine population, Filipino is among the 185 languages of the Philippines identified in the Ethnologue. Filipino is ideally a pluricentric language, in reality, however, Filipino has been variously described as simply Tagalog in syntax and grammar, with no grammatical element or lexicon coming from. Other major Philippine languages, and as essentially a version of Tagalog. In most contexts, Filipino is understood to be a name for Tagalog. There was no language in the Philippine archipelago when the Spanish arrived in the 16th century. The four major trade languages were Visayan, Kapampangan, Pangasinan, as the Philippine languages are all closely related and therefore easy for Filipinos to learn, most speakers of smaller languages spoke two or more of such regional languages. The first dictionary of Tagalog was written by the Franciscan Pedro de San Buenaventura, a latter book of the same name was written by Czech Jesuit missionary Paul Klein at the beginning of the 18th century. Klein spoke Tagalog and used it actively in several of his books and he wrote the first dictionary, which he later passed over to Francisco Jansens and José Hernandez. On November 13,1936, Commonwealth act No, on November 12,1937, the First National Assembly of the Philippine Commonwealth approved the law for the establishment of the Surián ng Wikang Pambansâ. This institute would be responsible for surveying and researching existing native languages in order to determine among them the basis for a national language of the Philippines. Then-president Manuel L. Quezon later appointed representatives for each major regional language to form NLI, sales Rodriguez, Hadji Butu, and Cecilio Lopez. On December 13,1937, Presisis of the new national language, Spanish was the language of the 1896 Revolution and the Katipunan, but the revolution was led by people who also spoke Tagalog. In 1959, the became known as Pilipino in an effort to dissociate it from the Tagalog ethnic group. However, neither the nor the amended version specified either Tagalog or Pilipino as the basis for Filipino. Instead they tasked the National Assembly to, take steps toward the development and this move has drawn much criticism from the nations other ethnic groups
8.
Burmese language
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The Burmese language is the official language of Myanmar. Although the Constitution of Myanmar officially recognizes the English name of the language as the Myanmar language, Burmese is a tonal, pitch-register, and syllable-timed language, largely monosyllabic and analytic, with a subject–object–verb word order. It is a member of the Lolo-Burmese grouping of the Sino-Tibetan language family, the Burmese alphabet is ultimately descended from a Brahmic script, either Kadamba or Pallava. Burmese belongs to the Southern Burmish branch of the Sino-Tibetan languages, Burmese is the most widely spoken of the non-Sinitic Sino-Tibetan languages. Burmese was the fifth of the Sino-Tibetan languages to develop a system, after Chinese characters, the Pyu script, the Tibetan alphabet. However, several dialects substantially differ in Burmese with respect to vocabulary, lexical particles, the standard dialect of Burmese comes from the Irrawaddy River valley. Regional differences between speakers from Upper Burma, called anya tha အညာသား, and speakers from Lower Burma, called auk tha အောက်သား, occur in vocabulary choice, minor pronunciation differences do exist within the Irrawaddy River valley. For instance, for the term ဆွမ်း food offering, Lower Burmese speakers use instead of, the standard dialect is represented by the Yangon dialect because of the modern citys media influence and economic clout. In the past, the Mandalay dialect represented standard Burmese, moreover, with regard to kinship terminology, Upper Burmese speakers differentiate the maternal and paternal sides of a family whereas Lower Burmese speakers do not. Spoken Burmese is remarkably uniform among Burmese speakers, particularly living in the Irrawaddy valley. The figure would have much higher if non-Bamars were excluded. For the whole country, the rate was 49% for men and 5. 5% for women. The migration of Burmese speakers of Bamar descent to Lower Burma is relatively recent, as late as the mid-1700s, the Austroasiatic language Mon was the principal language of Lower Burma and the Mon people who inhabited it. After the Burmese-speaking Konbaung Dynastys victory over the Mon-speaking Restored Hanthawaddy Kingdom in 1757, by 1830, an estimated 90% of the population in the region identified themselves as Bamar due the influx from Upper Burma, assimilation, and intermarriage. In the British colonial era, British incentives, particularly geared toward rice production, as well as political instability in Upper Burma, more distinctive non-standard varieties emerge as one moves farther away from the Irrawaddy River valley toward peripheral areas of the country. These varieties include the Yaw, Palaw, Myeik, Tavoyan, despite substantial vocabulary and pronunciation differences, there is mutual intelligibility among most Burmese dialects. Dialects in Tanintharyi Region, including Palaw, Merguese and Tavoyan, are conservative in comparison to Standard Burmese. The Tavoyan and Intha dialects have preserved the /l/ medial, which is only found in Old Burmese inscriptions
9.
Thai language
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Thai, also known as Siamese or Central Thai, is the national and official language of Thailand and the native language of the Thai people and the vast majority of Thai Chinese. Thai is a member of the Tai group of the Tai–Kadai language family, over half of the words in Thai are borrowed from Pali, Sanskrit and Old Khmer. It is a tonal and analytic language, Thai also has a complex orthography and relational markers. Spoken Thai is mutually intelligible with Laotian, Thai is the official language of Thailand, natively spoken by over 20 million people. Standard Thai is based on the register of the classes of Bangkok. In addition to Central Thai, Thailand is home to other related Tai languages, Isan, the language of the Isan region of Thailand, a collective term for the various Lao dialects spoken in Thailand that show some Siamese Thai influences, which is written with the Thai script. It is spoken by about 20 million people, Thais from both inside and outside the Isan region often simply call this variant Lao when speaking informally. Northern Thai, spoken by about 6 million in the independent kingdom of Lanna. Shares strong similarities with Lao to the point that in the past the Siamese Thais referred to it as Lao. Southern Thai, spoken by about 4.5 million Phu Thai, spoken by half a million around Nakhon Phanom Province. Phuan, spoken by 200,000 in central Thailand and Isan, Shan, spoken by about 100,000 in north-west Thailand along the border with the Shan States of Burma, and by 3.2 million in Burma. Lü, spoken by about 1,000,000 in northern Thailand, and 600,000 more in Sipsong Panna, Burma, nyaw language, spoken by 50,000 in Nakhon Phanom Province, Sakhon Nakhon Province, Udon Thani Province of Northeast Thailand. Song, spoken by about 30,000 in central and northern Thailand, Elegant or Formal Thai, official and written version, includes respectful terms of address, used in simplified form in newspapers. Rhetorical Thai, used for public speaking, religious Thai, used when discussing Buddhism or addressing monks. Royal Thai, influenced by Khmer, this is used when addressing members of the family or describing their activities. Most Thais can speak and understand all of these contexts, street and Elegant Thai are the basis of all conversations. Rhetorical, religious, and royal Thai are taught in schools as the national curriculum, many scholars believe that the Thai script is derived from the Khmer script, which is modeled after the Brahmic script from the Indic family. However, in appearance, Thai is closer to Thai Dam script, the language and its script are closely related to the Lao language and script
10.
Lao language
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Lao, also referred to as Laotian, Thai Noi, is a tonal language of the Tai–Kadai language family. It is the language of Laos, and also spoken in the northeast of Thailand. The Lao language serves as an important lingua franca as the country of Laos consists of ethnic groups. Spoken Lao is mutually intelligible with the Thai language, Lao, like many languages in Laos, is written in the Lao script, an abugida. Although there is no standard, the Vientiane dialect has become the de facto standard. Oral history of the migrations is preserved in the legends of Khun Borom, Tai speakers in what is now Laos pushed out or absorbed earlier groups of Mon–Khmer and Austronesian languages. These Tai peoples are classified by the Lao government as Lao Loum or lowland Lao, Lao and Thai are also very similar and share most of their basic vocabulary, but differences in many basic words limit inter-comprehension. The Lao language consists primarily of native Lao words, because of Buddhism, however, Pali has contributed numerous terms, especially relating to religion and in conversation with members of the Sangha. Due to their proximity, Lao has influenced the Khmer and Thai languages. Formal writing has an amount of foreign loanwords, especially Pali and Sanskrit terms, much as Latin. For politeness, pronouns are used, plus ending statements with ແດ່ or ເດີ້, negative statements are made more polite by ending with ດອກ. The following are formal register examples, many consonants in Lao make a phonemic contrast between labialized and plain versions. The complete inventory of Lao consonants is as shown in the table below, hence, final /p/, /t/, and /k/ sounds are pronounced as, and respectively. * The glottal stop appears at the end when no final follows a short vowel, All vowels make a phonemic length distinction. The vowels are as shown in the table, Diphthongs are all centering diphthongs with falling sonority. There are six tones in unchecked syllables, that is. The number of tones is reduced to four in checked syllables. The only consonant clusters allowed are syllable initial clusters /kw/ or /kʰw/, any consonant may appear in the onset, but the labialized consonants do not occur before rounded vowels
11.
Khmer language
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Khmer /kmɛər/ or Cambodian is the language of the Khmer people and the official language of Cambodia. With approximately 16 million speakers, it is the second most widely spoken Austroasiatic language, Khmer has been influenced considerably by Sanskrit and Pali, especially in the royal and religious registers, through Hinduism and Buddhism. The vast majority of Khmer speakers speak Central Khmer, the dialect of the plain where the Khmer are most heavily concentrated. Within Cambodia, regional accents exist in remote areas but these are regarded as varieties of Central Khmer, outside of Cambodia, three distinct dialects are spoken by ethnic Khmers native to areas that were historically part of the Khmer Empire. The Northern Khmer dialect is spoken by over a million Khmers in the regions of Northeast Thailand and is treated by some linguists as a separate language. Khmer is primarily an analytic, isolating language, there are no inflections, conjugations or case endings. Instead, particles and auxiliary words are used to indicate grammatical relationships, general word order is subject–verb–object, and modifiers follow the word they modify. Classifiers appear after numbers when used to count nouns, though not always so consistently as in languages like Chinese, in spoken Khmer, topic-comment structure is common and the perceived social relation between participants determines which sets of vocabulary, such as pronouns and honorifics, are proper. Khmer differs from neighboring languages such as Thai, Burmese, Lao, words are stressed on the final syllable, hence many words conform to the typical Mon–Khmer pattern of a stressed syllable preceded by a minor syllable. The language has been written in the Khmer script, an abugida descended from the Brahmi script via the southern Indian Pallava script, approximately 79% of Cambodians are able to read Khmer. Khmer is a member of the Austroasiatic language family, the family in an area that stretches from the Malay Peninsula through Southeast Asia to East India. Austroasiatic, which also includes Mon, Vietnamese and Munda, has been studied since 1856 and was first proposed as a family in 1907. Despite the amount of research, there is doubt about the internal relationship of the languages of Austroasiatic. Diffloth places Khmer in a branch of the Mon-Khmer languages. In these classification schemes Khmers closest genetic relatives are the Bahnaric and Pearic languages, more recent classifications doubt the validity of the Mon-Khmer sub-grouping and place the Khmer language as its own branch of Austroasiatic equidistant from the other 12 branches of the family. Khmer is spoken by some 13 million people in Cambodia, where it is the official language and it is also a second language for most of the minority groups and indigenous hill tribes there. Additionally there are a million speakers of Khmer native to southern Vietnam and 1.4 million in northeast Thailand, Khmer dialects, although mutually intelligible, are sometimes quite marked. The dialects form a continuum running roughly north to south, the following is a classification scheme showing the development of the modern Khmer dialects
12.
Vietnamese language
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Vietnamese /ˌviɛtnəˈmiːz/ is an Austroasiatic language that originated in the north of modern-day Vietnam, where it is the national and official language. It is the language of the Vietnamese people, as well as a first or second language for the many ethnic minorities of Vietnam. As the result of Vietnamese emigration and cultural influence, Vietnamese speakers are found throughout the world, notably in East and Southeast Asia, North America, Australia, Vietnamese has also been officially recognized as a minority language in the Czech Republic. It is part of the Austroasiatic language family of which it has by far the most speakers, Vietnamese vocabulary has borrowings from Chinese, and it formerly used a modified set of Chinese characters called chữ nôm given vernacular pronunciation. The Vietnamese alphabet in use today is a Latin alphabet with diacritics for tones. As the national language, Vietnamese is spoken throughout Vietnam by ethnic Vietnamese, Vietnamese is also the native language of the Gin minority group in southern Guangxi Province in China. A significant number of speakers also reside in neighboring Cambodia. In the United States, Vietnamese is the sixth most spoken language, with over 1.5 million speakers and it is the third most spoken language in Texas, fourth in Arkansas and Louisiana, and fifth in California. Vietnamese is the seventh most spoken language in Australia, in France, it is the most spoken Asian language and the eighth most spoken immigrant language at home. Vietnamese is the official and national language of Vietnam. It is the first language of the majority of the Vietnamese population, in the Czech Republic, Vietnamese has been recognized as one of 14 minority languages, on the basis of communities that have either traditionally or on a long-term basis resided in the country. This status grants Czech citizens from the Vietnamese community the right to use Vietnamese with public authorities, Vietnamese is increasingly being taught in schools and institutions outside of Vietnam. Since the 1980s, Vietnamese language schools have been established for youth in many Vietnamese-speaking communities around the world, furthermore, there has also been a number of Germans studying Vietnamese due to increased economic investment in Vietnam. Vietnamese is taught in schools in the form of immersion to a varying degree in Cambodia, Laos. Classes teach students subjects in Vietnamese and another language, furthermore, in Thailand, Vietnamese is one of the most popular foreign languages in schools and colleges. Vietnamese was identified more than 150 years ago as part of the Mon–Khmer branch of the Austroasiatic language family. Later, Muong was found to be closely related to Vietnamese than other Mon–Khmer languages. The term Vietic was proposed by Hayes, who proposed to redefine Viet–Muong as referring to a subbranch of Vietic containing only Vietnamese and Muong
13.
Tamil language
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Tamil is a Dravidian language predominantly spoken by the Tamil people of India and Sri Lanka, and also by the Tamil diaspora, Sri Lankan Moors, Burghers, Douglas, and Chindians. Tamil is a language of two countries, Singapore and Sri Lanka. It has official status in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and it is also used as one of the languages of education in Malaysia, along with English, Malay and Mandarin. Tamil is also spoken by significant minorities in the four other South Indian states of Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana and it is one of the 22 scheduled languages of India. Tamil is one of the classical languages in the world. Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions from 500 BC have been found on Adichanallur and 2 and it has been described as the only language of contemporary India which is recognizably continuous with a classical past. The variety and quality of classical Tamil literature has led to it being described as one of the classical traditions. A recorded Tamil literature has been documented for over 2000 years, the earliest period of Tamil literature, Sangam literature, is dated from ca.300 BC – AD300. It has the oldest extant literature among other Dravidian languages, the earliest epigraphic records found on rock edicts and hero stones date from around the 3rd century BC. More than 55% of the inscriptions found by the Archaeological Survey of India are in the Tamil language. Tamil language inscriptions written in Brahmi script have been discovered in Sri Lanka, the two earliest manuscripts from India, acknowledged and registered by the UNESCO Memory of the World register in 1997 and 2005, were written in Tamil. In 1578, Portuguese Christian missionaries published a Tamil prayer book in old Tamil script named Thambiraan Vanakkam, the Tamil Lexicon, published by the University of Madras, was one of the earliest dictionaries published in the Indian languages. According to a 2001 survey, there were 1,863 newspapers published in Tamil, Tamil belongs to the southern branch of the Dravidian languages, a family of around 26 languages native to the Indian subcontinent. It is also classified as being part of a Tamil language family, the closest major relative of Tamil is Malayalam, the two began diverging around the 9th century CE. According to linguists like Bhadriraju Krishnamurti, Tamil, as a Dravidian language, descends from Proto-Dravidian, linguistic reconstruction suggests that Proto-Dravidian was spoken around the third millennium BC, possibly in the region around the lower Godavari river basin in peninsular India. The material evidence suggests that the speakers of Proto-Dravidian were of the associated with the Neolithic complexes of South India. The next phase in the reconstructed proto-history of Tamil is Proto-South Dravidian, the linguistic evidence suggests that Proto-South Dravidian was spoken around the middle of the second millennium BC, and that proto-Tamil emerged around the 3rd century BC. The earliest epigraphic attestations of Tamil are generally taken to have been shortly thereafter
14.
Australia
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Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands. It is the worlds sixth-largest country by total area, the neighbouring countries are Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and East Timor to the north, the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu to the north-east, and New Zealand to the south-east. Australias capital is Canberra, and its largest urban area is Sydney, for about 50,000 years before the first British settlement in the late 18th century, Australia was inhabited by indigenous Australians, who spoke languages classifiable into roughly 250 groups. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the 1850s most of the continent had been explored, on 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy comprising six states. The population of 24 million is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard, Australia has the worlds 13th-largest economy and ninth-highest per capita income. With the second-highest human development index globally, the country highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom. The name Australia is derived from the Latin Terra Australis a name used for putative lands in the southern hemisphere since ancient times, the Dutch adjectival form Australische was used in a Dutch book in Batavia in 1638, to refer to the newly discovered lands to the south. On 12 December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted, in 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially as Australia. The first official published use of the term Australia came with the 1830 publication of The Australia Directory and these first inhabitants may have been ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, were originally horticulturists, the northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by fishermen from Maritime Southeast Asia. The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the Duyfken captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, the Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent New Holland during the 17th century, but made no attempt at settlement. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688, in 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain. The first settlement led to the foundation of Sydney, and the exploration, a British settlement was established in Van Diemens Land, now known as Tasmania, in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. The United Kingdom formally claimed the part of Western Australia in 1828. Separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales, South Australia in 1836, Victoria in 1851, the Northern Territory was founded in 1911 when it was excised from South Australia
15.
Prime Minister of Australia
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The Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia is the head of government of Australia. The individual who holds the office is the most senior Minister of the Crown, the leader of the Cabinet, the office is not mentioned in the Constitution of Australia and exists only through longstanding political convention and tradition. Despite this, in practice it is the most powerful position in Australia. The individual who holds the office is commissioned by the Governor-General of Australia, almost always and according to convention, the Prime Minister is the leader of the majority party or largest party in a coalition of parties in the House of Representatives. However, there is no requirement that the prime minister sit in the House of Representatives. The only case where a member of the Senate was appointed minister was John Gorton. Malcolm Turnbull has held the office of Prime Minister since 15 September 2015, the Prime Minister and Treasurer are traditionally members of the House, but the Constitution does not have such a requirement. Before being sworn in as a Minister of the Crown, a person must first be sworn in as a member of the Federal Executive Council if they are not already a member. Membership of the Federal Executive Council entitles the member to the style of The Honourable for life, the senior members of the Executive Council constitute the Cabinet of Australia. The Prime Minister is, like ministers, normally sworn in by the Governor-General. When defeated in an election, or on resigning, the Prime Minister is said to hand in the commission, in the event of a Prime Minister dying in office, or becoming incapacitated, the Governor-General can terminate the commission. Despite the importance of the office of minister, the Constitution does not mention the office by name. The conventions of the Westminster system were thought to be entrenched in Australia by the authors of the Constitution that it was deemed unnecessary to detail them. The formal title of the portfolio has always been simply Prime Minister, except for the period of the Fourth Deakin Ministry, Page was the leader of the smaller party in the governing coalition, the Country Party. He held the office for three weeks until the UAP elected a new leader, Robert Menzies, in August 1941 Menzies resigned as prime minister. In July 1945 John Curtin died suddenly and his deputy, Frank Forde, was sworn in the next day as prime minister, although the Labor Party had not had an opportunity to meet and elect a new leader. Forde served for eight days until Ben Chifley was elected leader, Chifley was then sworn in, replacing Forde, who became Australias shortest-serving prime minister. Harold Holt disappeared while swimming on 17 December 1967 and was declared presumed dead on 19 December, the governor-general, Lord Casey, commissioned the Leader of the Country Party, John McEwen, to form a government until the Liberal Party elected a new leader
16.
Malcolm Turnbull
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Malcolm Bligh Turnbull is the 29th and current Prime Minister of Australia. The Turnbull Government was re-elected at the 2016 federal election though with a bare one-seat majority, Turnbull attended Sydney Grammar School before going to the University of Sydney, where he attained a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Laws. Turnbull then attended Brasenose College, Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, elevated to the Howard Cabinet in January 2007, he briefly served as Minister for the Environment and Water. Following the defeat of the Liberal Government at the 2007 federal election, Turnbull declared himself a candidate in the subsequent leadership election, following a period of poor opinion polling, Turnbull challenged and defeated Nelson by four votes and became Leader of the Opposition. This led to persistent tensions within the Liberal Party, with Turnbulls support for the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme proposed by the Rudd Government in late 2009 eventually causing a split. Tony Abbott, who was opposed to the Scheme, subsequently challenged Turnbull, Turnbull was subsequently sworn in as Prime Minister of Australia the following day and formed the Turnbull Government. However, at the closest federal majority result since the 1961 election, Malcolm Turnbull was born in Sydney on 24 October 1954 to Bruce Bligh Turnbull and Coral Magnolia Lansbury. Turnbulls maternal grandmother, May Lansbury, was born in England, Turnbulls father was a hotel broker. Turnbulls mother was an actor, a writer, an academic. Turnbull suffered asthma as a young child, Turnbulls parents separated when he was nine, with Turnbulls mother leaving first for New Zealand, and then the United States. Turnbull was then raised by his father, Turnbull is of direct paternal Scottish descent, his great-great-great grandfather John Turnbull arrived in 1802 in New South Wales and became a tailor. During his childhood, he practised Presbyterianism before becoming a Roman Catholic, Turnbull spent his first three years of school at Vaucluse Public School. He then attended the St Ives preparatory school at Sydney Grammar School as a boarder, in senior school he was a boarder at the former Randwick campus of the school while attending classes at the main College Street campus on a partial scholarship. He was senior school co-captain in 1972, as well as winning the Lawrence Campbell Oratory Competition, excelling particularly in the subjects such as English. However, contrary to certain sources, Turnbull was not the dux of his year at Sydney Grammar. In 1987, in memory of his father, he set up the Bruce Turnbull means-tested scholarship at Sydney Grammar. In 1973, Turnbull attended the University of Sydney and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1977, during his studies, he was active in student politics, serving as board director of the University of Sydney Union. He also worked as a political journalist for Nation Review, Radio 2SM, in 1978, Turnbull won a Rhodes Scholarship and attended Brasenose College, Oxford, where he studied for a Bachelor of Civil Law degree from 1978 to 1980, graduating with honours
17.
Brunei
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Brunei, officially the Nation of Brunei, the Abode of Peace, is a sovereign state located on the north coast of the island of Borneo in Southeast Asia. Apart from its coastline with the South China Sea, the country is surrounded by the state of Sarawak. It is separated into two parts by the Sarawak district of Limbang, Brunei is the only sovereign state completely on the island of Borneo, the remainder of the islands territory is divided between the nations of Malaysia and Indonesia. Bruneis population was 408,786 in July 2012, the maritime state was visited by Spains Magellan Expedition in 1521 and fought against Spain in the 1578 Castille War. During the 19th century, the Bruneian Empire began to decline, the Sultanate ceded Sarawak to James Brooke and installed him as the White Rajah, and it ceded Sabah to the British North Borneo Chartered Company. In 1888, Brunei became a British protectorate and was assigned a British resident as colonial manager in 1906, after the Japanese occupation during World War II, in 1959 a new constitution was written. In 1962, an armed rebellion against the monarchy was ended with the help of the British. Brunei gained its independence from the United Kingdom on 1 January 1984, Economic growth during the 1990s and 2000s, with the GDP increasing 56% from 1999 to 2008, transformed Brunei into an industrialised country. It has developed wealth from petroleum and natural gas fields. Brunei has the second-highest Human Development Index among the Southeast Asian nations, after Singapore, according to the International Monetary Fund, Brunei is ranked fifth in the world by gross domestic product per capita at purchasing power parity. The IMF estimated in 2011 that Brunei was one of two countries with a debt at 0% of the national GDP. Forbes also ranks Brunei as the fifth-richest nation out of 182, based on its petroleum, according to legend, Brunei was founded by Awang Alak Betatar, later to be Sultan Muhammad Shah. He moved from Garang, a place in the Temburong District to the Brunei River estuary, according to legend, upon landing he exclaimed, Baru nah, from which the name Brunei was derived. He was the first Muslim ruler of Brunei, before the rise of the Bruneian Empire under the Muslim Bolkiah Dynasty, Brunei is believed to have been under Buddhist rulers. It was renamed Barunai in the 14th century, possibly influenced by the Sanskrit word varuṇ, the word Borneo is of the same origin. In the countrys name, Negara Brunei Darussalam, darussalam means abode of peace. The people are pagans and are men of goodwill and their colour is whiter than that of the other sort. in this island justice is well administered. One of the earliest Chinese records is the 977 AD letter to Chinese emperor from the ruler of Po-ni, which some scholars believe to refer to Borneo
18.
Hassanal Bolkiah
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Hassanal Bolkiah, GCB GCMG is the 29th and current Sultan and Yang Di-Pertuan of Brunei. He is also the first and incumbent Prime Minister of Brunei, the eldest son of Sultan Omar Ali Saifuddien III and Raja Isteri Pengiran Anak Damit, he succeeded to the throne as the Sultan of Brunei, following the abdication of his father on 4 October 1967. The Sultan has been ranked among the wealthiest individuals in the world, the Sultan was born on 15 July 1946 in Brunei Town as Pengiran Muda Hassanal Bolkiah. The Sultan received high school education at Victoria Institution in Kuala Lumpur, after which he attended the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in the United Kingdom and he became the Sultan of Brunei Darussalam on 5 October 1967, after his father abdicated. His coronation was held on 1 August 1968, and made him the Yang di-Pertuan of Brunei, like his father, he has been knighted by Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, of which Brunei was a protectorate until 1984. Under Bruneis 1959 constitution, the Sultan is the head of state with full executive authority, on 9 March 2006, the Sultan was reported to have amended Bruneis constitution to make himself infallible under Bruneian law. Bolkiah, as Prime Minister, is also the head of government, in addition, he holds the portfolios both of Minister of Defense and Minister of Finance. He appointed himself as Inspector General of Police of the Royal Brunei Police Force, Bolkiah addressed the United Nations General Assembly on Brunei Darussalams admission to the United Nations in September 1984. In 1991, he introduced a conservative ideology to Brunei called Melayu Islam Beraja and he has recently favoured Brunei government democratisation and declared himself Prime Minister and President. In 2004, the Legislative Council, which had been dissolved since 1962, was reopened and his designated successor is his eldest son, Prince Al-Muhtadee Billah. The Sultans official residence is the Istana Nurul Iman, with 1,788 rooms,257 bathrooms, parts of the Ministry of Defence and Ministry of Finance are also located at the palace. The Crown Prince, who is the Senior Minister, works from offices at the Istana, hyatt Borneo Management Services and HM The Sultans flight maintain offices there. The University of Brunei Darussalam and Sultan Sharif Ali Islamic University were established, Technical and vocational institutions were also built, such as the Brunei Technological University, Sultan Saiful Rijal Technical College, and vocational schools. The religious Institute Tahfiz Al-Quran Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah was established, scholarships for study in the country and abroad were provided. The Royal Brunei Armed Forces were expanded with the establishment of three branches of the Royal Brunei Land Forces, Royal Brunei Navy and Royal Brunei Air Force. Medicines and medical treatment are free of charge to children, policemen and members of the Royal Brunei Armed Forces in hospitals and government clinics, there is one doctor per 949 patients. The life expectancy of the people and the population is 74.2 years for men and 77.3 years for women. Hassanal Bolkiah established the Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Foundation, in January 2013, the Royal College of General Practitioners created the honour of ‘Companion of the College’ to mark its 60th anniversary
19.
Cambodia
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Cambodia, officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is 181,035 square kilometres in area, bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the northeast, Vietnam to the east, Cambodia has a population of over 15 million. The official religion is Theravada Buddhism, practiced by approximately 95 percent of the population, the countrys minority groups include Vietnamese, Chinese, Chams, and 30 hill tribes. The capital and largest city is Phnom Penh, the political, economic, the kingdom is a constitutional monarchy with Norodom Sihamoni, a monarch chosen by the Royal Throne Council, as head of state. The head of government is Hun Sen, who is currently the longest serving leader in South East Asia and has ruled Cambodia for over 25 years. In 802 AD, Jayavarman II declared himself king, uniting the warring Khmer princes of Chenla under the name Kambuja. The Indianized kingdom built monumental temples including Angkor Wat, now a World Heritage Site, after the fall of Angkor to Ayutthaya in the 15th century, a reduced and weakened Cambodia was then ruled as a vassal state by its neighbours. In 1863 Cambodia became a protectorate of France which doubled the size of the country by reclaiming the north, the Vietnam War extended into the country with the US bombing of Cambodia from 1969 until 1973. Following the Cambodian coup of 1970, the king gave his support to his former enemies. Following the 1991 Paris Peace Accords, Cambodia was governed briefly by a United Nations mission, the UN withdrew after holding elections in which around 90 percent of the registered voters cast ballots. The 1997 coup placed power solely in the hands of Prime Minister Hun Sen and the Cambodian Peoples Party, important sociopolitical issues includes widespread poverty, pervasive corruption, lack of political freedoms, low human development, and a high rate of hunger. While per capita income remains low compared to most neighbouring countries, agriculture remains the dominant economic sector, with strong growth in textiles, construction, garments, and tourism leading to increased foreign investment and international trade. Cambodia scored dismally in an annual index ranking the rule of law in 102 countries, placing 99th overall, Cambodia also faces environmental destruction as an imminent problem. The most severe activity in this regard is considered to be the countrywide deforestation, the Kingdom of Cambodia is the official English name of the country. The English Cambodia is an anglicisation of the French Cambodge, which in turn is the French transliteration of the Khmer Kampuchea, Kampuchea is the shortened alternative to the countrys official name in Khmer, Preah Reacheanachak Kampuchea. The Khmer endonym Kampuchea derives from the Sanskrit name Kambujadeśa, composed of देश, desa and कम्बोज, Kambujas, colloquially, Cambodians refer to their country as either Srok Khmer, meaning Khmers Land, or the slightly more formal Prateh Kampuchea, literally Country of Kampuchea. The name Cambodia is used most often in the Western world while Kampuchea is more used in the East. Excavations in its lower layers produced a series of dates as of 6000 BC
20.
Prime Minister of Cambodia
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The Prime Minister of Cambodia is the head of government of Cambodia. The prime minister is also the chairman of the Cabinet and leads the executive branch of the Royal Cambodian Government, the prime minister is required to be a member of parliament, and is appointed by the monarch for a term of five years. Since 1945, there have been 36 prime ministers, the incumbent prime minister, since 1985, is Hun Sen of the Cambodian Peoples Party. He previously served from 1985 to 1993 and was prime minister from 1993 to 1998. He was elected as minister in his own right in 1998. He is the longest serving minister in Cambodian history. The position was first held by King Norodom Sihanouk in March 1945, cambodias first parliamentary elections were held on 1 September 1946. The Democratic Party remained the dominant-party in Cambodian politics throughout the 1940s until the formation of the Sangkum Reastr Niyum in 1955, Sangkum was the dominant-party in Cambodia from 1955 to 1970 following a military coup by General Lon Nol. Until 1993, it was not an elected position, merely few prime ministers were elected including Sisowath Youtevong, Norodom Sihanouk, and Lon Nol. In 1993, constitutional monarchy was restored in Cambodia, the role of the prime minister was officially recognized in the constitution. Norodom Ranariddh became the first democratically elected prime minister, the prime minister is required to be a member of parliament. He first needs to be elected by a majority of parliament before a ceremony can take place. The inauguration of the prime minister takes place at the Royal Palace, the prime minister-designate takes an oath of office in front of the monarch and the two heads of the Thammayut and Mohanikay order. A cabinet will then be unveiled, the formation of a new government takes place no more than 60 days after the election, as defined in the constitution. The prime minister is assisted by deputy prime ministers, article 125 of the Constitution states that should the prime minister resign or die in office, an acting prime minister is appointed. The Peace Palace serves as the workplace of the prime minister. It was inaugurated on 19 October 2010 by the King, however, the prime minister resides at his own private residence. The powers of the Prime Minister are established by the current Constitution of Cambodia, adopted on 24 September 1993, article 13, Within seven days at most - after the vacancy of the throne - the new King of Cambodia is selected by the Throne Council
21.
Hun Sen
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Hun Sen is the Prime Minister of Cambodia, President of the Cambodian Peoples Party, and Member of Parliament for Kandal. He has served as Prime Minister since 1985, making him the longest serving head of government of Cambodia, from 1979 to 1986 and again from 1987 to 1990, Hun Sen served as Cambodias foreign minister. His full honorary title is Samdech Akeak Moha Sena Padey Techo Hun Sen, born Hun Bunal, he changed his name to Hun Sen in 1972 two years after joining the Khmer Rouge. Hun Sen rose to the premiership in January 1985 when the one-party National Assembly appointed him to succeed Chan Sy who had died in office in December 1984 and he held the position until the 1993 UN-backed elections, which resulted in a hung parliament. After contentious negotiations with the FUNCINPEC, Hun Sen was accepted as Second Prime Minister, ung Huot was then selected to succeed Ranariddh. In the 1998 election, he led the CPP to victory but had to form a government with FUNCINPEC. Hun Sen has since led the CPP to victory consecutively, and is serving in his fifth prime ministerial term. In June 2015, following the death of Chea Sim, Hun Sen was elected president of the CPP, Hun Sen was 32 years old when he became prime minister, making him at that time the worlds youngest head of government. Hun Sen has accumulated highly centralized power in Cambodia, including a personal guard said to have capabilities rivalling those of the regular army. The former Khmer Rouge commander has consolidated his grip on power through a web of patronage, Hun Sen was born in Kampong Cham as Hun Bunal, the third of six children in a peasant family. His father, Hun Neang, was a resident monk in a local Wat in Kampong Cham province before defrocking himself to join the French resistance and married Hun Sens mother, Dee Yon, Hun Neangs paternal grandparents were wealthy landowners of Teochew Chinese heritage. Hun Sen left his family at the age of 13 to attend a school in Phnom Penh. When Lon Nol usurped power from Sihanouk in 1970 during a bloodless coup, two years later, Hun Nal changed his name to Hun Sen. Hun Sen came to power with the Khmer Rouge and served as a Battalion Commander in the Eastern Region of Democratic Kampuchea. In 1977, during internal purges of the Khmer Rouge regime, Hun Sen, Hun Sen became one of the leaders of the rebel army and government that the Vietnamese government sponsored when they prepared to invade Cambodia. When the Khmer Rouge regime was defeated, Hun Sen was appointed as Deputy Prime Minister, as the de facto leader of Cambodia, in 1985, he was elected as Chairman of the Council of Ministers and Prime Minister, after the death of Chan Sy. As Foreign Minister and then Prime Minister, Hun Sen played a role in the 1991 Paris Peace Talks. During this period Prince Norodom Sihanouk referred to him as a one eyed lackey of the Vietnamese, in 1987, Amnesty International accused Hun Sens government of torture of thousands of political prisoners using electric shocks, hot irons and near-suffocation with plastic bags. From 1993 until 1998 he was Co-Prime Minister with Prince Norodom Ranariddh, in 1997, the coalition was shaken by tensions between Ranariddh and Hun Sen. FUNCINPEC began to discuss with the remaining Khmer Rouge rebels, with the aim of absorbing them into its ranks
22.
China
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China, officially the Peoples Republic of China, is a unitary sovereign state in East Asia and the worlds most populous country, with a population of over 1.381 billion. The state is governed by the Communist Party of China and its capital is Beijing, the countrys major urban areas include Shanghai, Guangzhou, Beijing, Chongqing, Shenzhen, Tianjin and Hong Kong. China is a power and a major regional power within Asia. Chinas landscape is vast and diverse, ranging from forest steppes, the Himalaya, Karakoram, Pamir and Tian Shan mountain ranges separate China from much of South and Central Asia. The Yangtze and Yellow Rivers, the third and sixth longest in the world, respectively, Chinas coastline along the Pacific Ocean is 14,500 kilometers long and is bounded by the Bohai, Yellow, East China and South China seas. China emerged as one of the worlds earliest civilizations in the basin of the Yellow River in the North China Plain. For millennia, Chinas political system was based on hereditary monarchies known as dynasties, in 1912, the Republic of China replaced the last dynasty and ruled the Chinese mainland until 1949, when it was defeated by the communist Peoples Liberation Army in the Chinese Civil War. The Communist Party established the Peoples Republic of China in Beijing on 1 October 1949, both the ROC and PRC continue to claim to be the legitimate government of all China, though the latter has more recognition in the world and controls more territory. China had the largest economy in the world for much of the last two years, during which it has seen cycles of prosperity and decline. Since the introduction of reforms in 1978, China has become one of the worlds fastest-growing major economies. As of 2016, it is the worlds second-largest economy by nominal GDP, China is also the worlds largest exporter and second-largest importer of goods. China is a nuclear weapons state and has the worlds largest standing army. The PRC is a member of the United Nations, as it replaced the ROC as a permanent member of the U. N. Security Council in 1971. China is also a member of numerous formal and informal multilateral organizations, including the WTO, APEC, BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the BCIM, the English name China is first attested in Richard Edens 1555 translation of the 1516 journal of the Portuguese explorer Duarte Barbosa. The demonym, that is, the name for the people, Portuguese China is thought to derive from Persian Chīn, and perhaps ultimately from Sanskrit Cīna. Cīna was first used in early Hindu scripture, including the Mahābhārata, there are, however, other suggestions for the derivation of China. The official name of the state is the Peoples Republic of China. The shorter form is China Zhōngguó, from zhōng and guó and it was then applied to the area around Luoyi during the Eastern Zhou and then to Chinas Central Plain before being used as an occasional synonym for the state under the Qing
23.
Premier of the People's Republic of China
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This position was originally known as Premier of the Government Administration Council of the Central Peoples Government and changed to its current name in 1954. The Premier is formally approved by the National Peoples Congress upon the nomination of the President, in practice, the candidate is chosen through an informal process within the Communist Party of China. Both the President and the Premier are selected once every five years, the Premier has always been a member of the powerful Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China. The current Premier is Li Keqiang, who took office on 15 March 2013, the Premier is the highest administrative position in the Government of the Peoples Republic of China. The Premier is responsible for organizing and administering the Chinese civil bureaucracy, for example, the Premier is tasked with planning and implementing national economic, social development and the state budget. The Premiers powers and responsibilities are codified into the constitution unlike the Prime Minister from the Westminster system as by convention or traditions, the Premier has been supported by four Vice-Premiers since Deng Xiaopings reform in 1983. The First-ranked Vice Premier will act in the capacity in their absence. As of April 2017, there are three living former premiers, Since the first premier, seven had a spouse during term of office
24.
Li Keqiang
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Li Keqiang is the current Premier of the State Council of the Peoples Republic of China. An economist by training, Li is Chinas head of government as well as one of the figures behind Chinese economic policy. He is also the member of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China. Li is a part of the fifth generation of Chinese leadership. Li was named the Worlds 12th Most Powerful Person by the Forbes list of The Worlds Most Powerful People in 2015 and 2016, Li rose through the ranks through his involvement in the Communist Youth League. From 1998 to 2004, Li served as the Governor of Henan, from 2004 to 2007 he served as the Party Secretary of Liaoning, the top political office in the province. Given his Youth League experience, Li has generally been considered an ally of former leader Hu Jintao. Li assumed the post of Premier in 2013, and has facilitated the Chinese governments shifting of priorities from export-led growth to a focus on internal consumption. Li has also been a force behind the implementation of the comprehensively deepening reforms announced in the fall of 2013. Li was born on 1 July 1955 in Hefei, the capital and his father was a local official in Anhui. He was awarded the honour of Outstanding Individual in the Study of Mao Zedong Thought during this time and he earned a PhD in economics in 1995, and the prominent economist Li Yining was his doctoral advisor. His doctoral dissertation was awarded the Sun Yefang Prize, Chinas highest prize in economics, in 1980, Li became the Communist Youth League secretary at Peking University. Li became the organizations First Secretary in 1993 and served until 1998 and he is a representative member of the first generation to have risen from the CYL leadership. Li became the youngest Chinese provincial governor in June 1998 when he was appointed governor of Henan at the age of 43, according to provincial officials working with him at the time, Li refused to participate in any banquets or large fancy events not related to government activities. During his time as governor, a sense of his bad luck grew due to the occurrence of three major fires in the province. Li is known to be outspoken and led development in Henan. Li did not spend time pursuing superficial projects and he trekked through all regions of the province trying to search for a comprehensive solution to its growing problems. Henan jumped in national GDP rankings from 28th in the early 1990s to 18th in 2004, however, his government was relatively ineffective at curbing the HIV/AIDS epidemic that was affecting the rural areas of the province
25.
India
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India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and it is bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the southwest, and the Bay of Bengal on the southeast. It shares land borders with Pakistan to the west, China, Nepal, and Bhutan to the northeast, in the Indian Ocean, India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives. Indias Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a border with Thailand. The Indian subcontinent was home to the urban Indus Valley Civilisation of the 3rd millennium BCE, in the following millennium, the oldest scriptures associated with Hinduism began to be composed. Social stratification, based on caste, emerged in the first millennium BCE, early political consolidations took place under the Maurya and Gupta empires, the later peninsular Middle Kingdoms influenced cultures as far as southeast Asia. In the medieval era, Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Christianity, and Islam arrived, much of the north fell to the Delhi sultanate, the south was united under the Vijayanagara Empire. The economy expanded in the 17th century in the Mughal empire, in the mid-18th century, the subcontinent came under British East India Company rule, and in the mid-19th under British crown rule. A nationalist movement emerged in the late 19th century, which later, under Mahatma Gandhi, was noted for nonviolent resistance, in 2015, the Indian economy was the worlds seventh largest by nominal GDP and third largest by purchasing power parity. Following market-based economic reforms in 1991, India became one of the major economies and is considered a newly industrialised country. However, it continues to face the challenges of poverty, corruption, malnutrition, a nuclear weapons state and regional power, it has the third largest standing army in the world and ranks sixth in military expenditure among nations. India is a constitutional republic governed under a parliamentary system. It is a pluralistic, multilingual and multi-ethnic society and is home to a diversity of wildlife in a variety of protected habitats. The name India is derived from Indus, which originates from the Old Persian word Hindu, the latter term stems from the Sanskrit word Sindhu, which was the historical local appellation for the Indus River. The ancient Greeks referred to the Indians as Indoi, which translates as The people of the Indus, the geographical term Bharat, which is recognised by the Constitution of India as an official name for the country, is used by many Indian languages in its variations. Scholars believe it to be named after the Vedic tribe of Bharatas in the second millennium B. C. E and it is also traditionally associated with the rule of the legendary emperor Bharata. Gaṇarājya is the Sanskrit/Hindi term for republic dating back to the ancient times, hindustan is a Persian name for India dating back to the 3rd century B. C. E. It was introduced into India by the Mughals and widely used since then and its meaning varied, referring to a region that encompassed northern India and Pakistan or India in its entirety
26.
Prime Minister of India
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The Prime Minister of India is the Head of Government and leader of the executive branch of the Government of India. The Prime Minister is also the adviser to the President of India. He or she can be a member of any of the two houses of Parliament, but has to be the leader of the party, having a majority in the Lok Sabha. The Prime Minister is the member of cabinet in the executive branch of government in a parliamentary system. The Prime Minister selects and can dismiss other members of the cabinet, allocates posts to members within the Government, is the presiding member and chairman of the cabinet. The federal or union cabinet headed by the Prime Minister is appointed by the President of India to assist the latter in the administration of the affairs of the executive, Union cabinet is collectively responsible to the Lok Sabha as per Article 75. The Prime Minister shall always enjoy the confidence of Lok Sabha, India follows a parliamentary system in which the prime minister is the presiding, actual head of the government and chief of the executive branch. In such systems, the head of state or the head of states official representative usually holds a ceremonial position. The Prime Minister shall become a member of parliament within six months of beginning his/her tenure, he/She is expected to work with other central ministers to ensure the passage of bills by the Parliament. There shall be a Council of Ministers with the minister at the head to aid and advise the president who shall, in the exercise of his functions. The Prime Minister shall be appointed by the President and the other Ministers shall be appointed by the President on the advice of the Prime Minister. Like most parliamentary democracies, a Presidents duties are mostly ceremonial as long as the constitution and the rule of law is obeyed by the Union Cabinet, the Prime Minister of India is the head of union government and has the responsibility for executive power. The prime minister leads the functioning and exercise of authority of the government of India. President of India invites a person who is commanding support of majority members of Lok Sabha to form government at the federal level, in practice the prime minister nominates the members of their Council of Ministers to the president. They also work upon to decide a core group of Ministers as in-charge of the important functions, some specific ministries/department are not allocated to anyone in the cabinet but the prime minister himself. Per Article 78 of the constitution, the communication between the union cabinet and the president are through the prime minister. Other wise constitution recognises the prime minister as a member of the cabinet only outside the sphere of union cabinet. Be a member of the Lok Sabha or the Rajya Sabha
27.
Narendra Modi
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Narendra Damodardas Modi is an Indian politician who is the 14th and current Prime Minister of India, in office since May 2014. He was the Chief Minister of Gujarat from 2001 to 2014, Modi, a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party, is a Hindu nationalist and member of the right-wing Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. Born to a Gujarati family in Vadnagar, Modi helped his father sell tea as a child and he was introduced to the RSS at the age of eight, beginning a long association with the organisation. He left home after graduating school, partly because of an arranged marriage which he rejected. Modi traveled around India for two years, and visited a number of religious centres and he returned to Gujarat and moved to Ahmedabad in 1969 or 1970. In 1971 he became a worker for the RSS. During the state of emergency imposed across the country in 1975, the RSS assigned him to the BJP in 1985, and he held several positions within the party hierarchy until 2001, rising to the rank of general secretary. Modi was appointed minister of Gujarat in 2001, due to Keshubhai Patels failing health. Modi was elected to the assembly soon after. His administration has been considered complicit in the 2002 Gujarat riots, or otherwise criticised for its handling of it and his policies as chief minister, credited with encouraging economic growth, have received praise, and several industrial projects were begun during his tenure. His administration has been criticised for failing to improve health, poverty. Modi led the BJP in the 2014 general election, which gave the party a majority in the Lok Sabha, Modi himself was elected to parliament from Varanasi. Modi has attempted to improve efficiency in the bureaucracy, and centralised power through the abolition of the planning commission and he has begun a high-profile sanitation campaign, and weakened or abolished environmental and labour laws. Narendra Modi was born on 17 September 1950 to a family of grocers in Vadnagar, Mehsana district and he was the third of six children born to Damodardas Mulchand Modi and Hiraben Modi. Modis family belonged to the Modh-Ghanchi-Teli community, which is categorised as an Other Backward Class by the Indian government, as a child, Modi helped his father sell tea at the Vadnagar railway station, and later ran a tea stall with his brother near a bus terminus. Modi completed his secondary education in Vadnagar in 1967, where a teacher described him as an average student. Modi had a gift for rhetoric in debates, and this was noted by his teachers. Modi preferred playing larger-than-life characters in theatrical productions, which has influenced his political image, when eight years old, Modi discovered the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, and began attending its local shakhas
28.
Indonesia
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Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a unitary sovereign state and transcontinental country located mainly in Southeast Asia with some territories in Oceania. Situated between the Indian and Pacific oceans, it is the worlds largest island country, with more than seventeen thousand islands. At 1,904,569 square kilometres, Indonesia is the worlds 14th-largest country in terms of area and worlds 7th-largest country in terms of combined sea. It has an population of over 260 million people and is the worlds fourth most populous country. The worlds most populous island, Java, contains more than half of the countrys population, Indonesias republican form of government includes an elected legislature and president. Indonesia has 34 provinces, of which five have Special Administrative status and its capital and countrys most populous city is Jakarta, which is also the most populous city in Southeast Asia and the second in Asia. The country shares land borders with Papua New Guinea, East Timor, other neighbouring countries include Singapore, Vietnam, the Philippines, Australia, Palau, and the Indian territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Despite its large population and densely populated regions, Indonesia has vast areas of wilderness that support the second highest level of biodiversity. The country has abundant natural resources like oil and natural gas, tin, copper, agriculture mainly produces rice, palm oil, tea, coffee, cacao, medicinal plants, spices and rubber. Indonesias major trading partners are Japan, United States, China, the Indonesian archipelago has been an important region for trade since at least the 7th century, when Srivijaya and then later Majapahit traded with China and India. Local rulers gradually absorbed foreign cultural, religious and political models from the early centuries CE, Indonesian history has been influenced by foreign powers drawn to its natural resources. Indonesia consists of hundreds of native ethnic and linguistic groups. The largest – and politically dominant – ethnic group are the Javanese, a shared identity has developed, defined by a national language, ethnic diversity, religious pluralism within a Muslim-majority population, and a history of colonialism and rebellion against it. Indonesias national motto, Bhinneka Tunggal Ika, articulates the diversity that shapes the country, Indonesias economy is the worlds 16th largest by nominal GDP and the 8th largest by GDP at PPP, the largest in Southeast Asia, and is considered an emerging market and newly industrialised country. Indonesia has been a member of the United Nations since 1950, Indonesia is a member of the G20 major economies and World Trade Organization. The name Indonesia derives from the Greek name of the Indós, the name dates to the 18th century, far predating the formation of independent Indonesia. In 1850, George Windsor Earl, an English ethnologist, proposed the terms Indunesians—and, his preference, in the same publication, one of his students, James Richardson Logan, used Indonesia as a synonym for Indian Archipelago. However, Dutch academics writing in East Indies publications were reluctant to use Indonesia, they preferred Malay Archipelago, the Netherlands East Indies, popularly Indië, the East, and Insulinde
29.
President of Indonesia
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The President of the Republic of Indonesia is the head of state and head of government of the Republic of Indonesia. The President leads the executive branch of the Indonesian government and is the commander-in-chief of the Indonesian National Armed Forces, on 20 October 2014, Joko Widodo became the 7th and current President of Indonesia. The Indonesian presidency was established during the formulation of the 1945 Constitution by the Committee for Preparatory Work for Indonesian Independence, on 16 October 1945, Vice-President Mohammad Hatta announced a vice-presidential decree which turned the Central National Committee of Indonesia equal status with that of the president. On 11 November 1945, the KNIP made the decision to separate the role of Head of State with that of Head of Government, during the Indonesian National Revolution, both Sukarno and Hatta were captured by the Dutch in Yogyakarta on 18 December 1948. Sukarno then gave a mandate for Sjafruddin Prawiranegara to form an emergency Government and this was done and the Emergency Government of the Republic of Indonesia was formed in Sumatra with Prawiranegara as its Chairman. Prawiranegara handed back his mandate to Sukarno on 13 July 1949, on 17 December 1949, Sukarno was elected president of the Republic of the United States of Indonesia and presidential mandate passed to Assaat. When it became clear that RIS was going to be replaced by a state, Asaat stepped down from the presidency. Indonesia now adopted the constitution that had been intended for RIS, officially known as the Provisional Constitution, the document confirmed the presidents role as the Head of State, but limited him to a mostly ceremonial role. He appointed a Prime Minister on the advice of formateurs, despite his limited constitutional role, Sukarno commanded great moral authority. Nonetheless, he was never content with the role of ceremonial Head of State, the rest of the decade saw a series of unstable governments. Taking advantage of the situation, Sukarno made a speech in April 1959, the People reacted enthusiastically and there was strong pressure on the Constituante, the body responsible for formulating a new constitution, to adopt the 1945 Constitution. When the Constituante did not budge, Sukarno issued a Presidential Decree on 5 July 1959 declaring that Indonesia was returning to the 1945 Constitution and that document made the president head of government as well as head of state. In 1963, Sukarno declared himself president for Life, although Indonesia had re-adopted the 1945 Constitution, it did not mean that it was strictly adhered to. The MPR, which at this stage was still on a basis, was subservient to the president despite its status of the Nations highest Governing Body. It was only in 1966, when the tide began to turn against Sukarno that the MPRS nominally regained its rightful constitutional status. All throughout his rise to power, General Suharto seemed determined to do things constitutionally, Suharto allowed the MPR to execute its constitutional duty of formulating the Broad Outlines of State Policy whilst he as the president would be responsible for implementing GBHN. Suharto also made it an obligation to deliver accountability speeches towards the end of his terms. During the speech, Suharto outlined the achievements that his administration had made, despite the constitutional and democratic façade, Suharto made sure that the MPR was also subservient to him
30.
Joko Widodo
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Joko Widodo is the seventh President of Indonesia, in office since 2014. Previously he was the Mayor of Surakarta from 2005 to 2012 and he is the first Indonesian president without a high-ranking political or military background. Jokowi was nominated by his party, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle, Jokowi was elected as Governor of Jakarta on 20 September 2012 after a second round runoff election in which he defeated the incumbent governor Fauzi Bowo. Jokowis win was seen as reflecting popular voter support for new or clean leaders rather than the old style of politics in Indonesia. His nomination as PDI-P candidate for the 2014 presidential election was announced on 14 March 2014, the presidential election was held on 9 July 2014. After some controversy about the result of the election, Jokowi was named as president-elect on 22 July, Joko Widodo is of Javanese descent. Before changing his name, Jokowi was called Mulyono and his father came from Karanganyar, his grandparents came from a village in Boyolali. His education began in State Primary School 111, Tirtoyoso, known for being a school for the wealthy citizens. At the age of twelve, he started working in his fathers furniture workshop, the evictions he experienced three times in his childhood affected his way of thinking and his leadership later on as the mayor of Surakarta as he organised housing in the city. After primary school, he continued his studies in SMP Negeri 1 Surakarta and he had wanted to continue his education in SMA Negeri 1 Surakarta, but he failed the entrance exam and went to SMA Negeri 6 Surakarta instead. Joko Widodo graduated from Faculty of Forestry at Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta in 1985 to study, Jokowi began his tenure at a state-owned enterprise company called PT Kertas Kraft Aceh, but went home not long after due to his disinterest. He then began working for his grandfathers furniture factory, before establishing his own company called Rakabu, the companys fine product has its fame heard internationally, as they are also exported to the Western World. It was in France where his furniture product first start penertrating European market and this brought Widodo to a customer named Bernard, who gave him the nickname he is famous for, Jokowi. Ultimately he was inspired to become a politician so that he can transform his hometown, Surakarta, Jokowi ran for mayoral race in 2005 together with his running mate, F. X. Hadi Rudyatmo, winning 36. 62% of the vote against the incumbent Slamet Suryanto and 2 other candidates, when he first ran for the office of mayor of Surakarta, his background as a property and furniture businessman was questioned. He adopted the development framework of European cities into his own city of Surakarta, in 2007, Surakarta had also hosted the World Music Festival which was held at the complex of Fort Vastenburg. The FMD in 2008 was held in the Mangkunegaran Palace Complex, part of Jokowis personal style was his populist can-do elements designed to build bonds with the broad electorate. Following the electric company policy to pursue a more disciplined approach to collecting overdue bills, the city government quickly authorized payment but in settling the bill protested that it should consider the public interest before taking this type of action
31.
Japan
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Japan is a sovereign island nation in Eastern Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies off the eastern coast of the Asia Mainland and stretches from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea, the kanji that make up Japans name mean sun origin. 日 can be read as ni and means sun while 本 can be read as hon, or pon, Japan is often referred to by the famous epithet Land of the Rising Sun in reference to its Japanese name. Japan is an archipelago consisting of about 6,852 islands. The four largest are Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu and Shikoku, the country is divided into 47 prefectures in eight regions. Hokkaido being the northernmost prefecture and Okinawa being the southernmost one, the population of 127 million is the worlds tenth largest. Japanese people make up 98. 5% of Japans total population, approximately 9.1 million people live in the city of Tokyo, the capital of Japan. Archaeological research indicates that Japan was inhabited as early as the Upper Paleolithic period, the first written mention of Japan is in Chinese history texts from the 1st century AD. Influence from other regions, mainly China, followed by periods of isolation, from the 12th century until 1868, Japan was ruled by successive feudal military shoguns who ruled in the name of the Emperor. Japan entered into a period of isolation in the early 17th century. The Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937 expanded into part of World War II in 1941, which came to an end in 1945 following the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Japan is a member of the UN, the OECD, the G7, the G8, the country has the worlds third-largest economy by nominal GDP and the worlds fourth-largest economy by purchasing power parity. It is also the worlds fourth-largest exporter and fourth-largest importer, although Japan has officially renounced its right to declare war, it maintains a modern military with the worlds eighth-largest military budget, used for self-defense and peacekeeping roles. Japan is a country with a very high standard of living. Its population enjoys the highest life expectancy and the third lowest infant mortality rate in the world, in ancient China, Japan was called Wo 倭. It was mentioned in the third century Chinese historical text Records of the Three Kingdoms in the section for the Wei kingdom, Wa became disliked because it has the connotation of the character 矮, meaning dwarf. The 倭 kanji has been replaced with the homophone Wa, meaning harmony, the Japanese word for Japan is 日本, which is pronounced Nippon or Nihon and literally means the origin of the sun. The earliest record of the name Nihon appears in the Chinese historical records of the Tang dynasty, at the start of the seventh century, a delegation from Japan introduced their country as Nihon
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Prime Minister of Japan
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The Prime Minister of Japan is the head of government of Japan. The Prime Minister is appointed by the Emperor of Japan after being designated by the National Diet and he or she is the head of the Cabinet and appoints and dismisses the other Ministers of State. The literal translation of the Japanese name for the office is Minister for the Comprehensive Administration of the Cabinet, prior to the adoption of the Meiji Constitution, Japan had in practice no written constitution. Originally, a Chinese-inspired legal system known as ritsuryō was enacted in the late Asuka period, theoretically, the last ritsuryō code, the Yōrō Code enacted in 752, was still in force at the time of the Meiji Restoration. It took its current form with the adoption of the Constitution of Japan in 1947, to date,62 people have served this position. The current Prime Minister is Shinzō Abe, who re-took office on December 26,2012 and he is the first former Prime Minister to return to office since 1948, and the 6th longest serving member to date. The Prime Minister is designated by both houses of the Diet, before the conduct of any other business, for that purpose, each conducts a ballot under the run-off system. If the two houses choose different individuals, then a joint committee of both houses is appointed to agree on a common candidate. Ultimately, however, if the two houses do not agree within ten days, the decision of the House of Representatives is deemed to be that of the Diet, therefore, the House of Representatives can theoretically ensure the appointment of any Prime Minister it wants. The candidate is presented with their commission, and formally appointed to office by the Emperor. Must be a member of house of the Diet. Note that former officers from the World War II-era may be appointed prime minister despite the civilian requirement. Exercises control and supervision over the executive branch. Presents bills to the Diet on behalf of the Cabinet, appoints all Cabinet ministers, and can dismiss them at any time. May permit legal action to be taken against Cabinet ministers, must make reports on domestic and foreign relations to the Diet. Must report to the Diet upon demand to provide answers or explanations, may advise the Emperor to dissolve the Diets House of Representatives. Presides over meetings of the Cabinet, commander in chief of the Japan Self-Defense Forces. May override a court injunction against an act upon showing of cause
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Laos
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Present day Laos traces its historic and cultural identity to the kingdom of Lan Xang Hom Khao, which existed for four centuries as one of the largest kingdoms in Southeast Asia. Due to Lan Xangs central geographical location in Southeast Asia, the kingdom was able to become a hub for overland trade. After a period of conflict, Lan Xang broke off into three separate kingdoms— Luang Phabang, Vientiane and Champasak. In 1893, it became a French protectorate, with the three territories uniting to form what is now known as the country of Laos and it briefly gained independence in 1945 after Japanese occupation, but returned to French rule until it was granted autonomy in 1949. Laos became independent in 1953, with a monarchy under Sisavang Vong. Shortly after independence, a civil war ended the monarchy. Laos is a one-party socialist republic and it espouses Marxism and is governed by the Lao Peoples Revolutionary Party, in which the party leadership is dominated by military figures. The Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the Vietnam Peoples Army continue to have significant influence in Laos, other large cities include Luang Prabang, Savannakhet, and Pakse. Laos is a country with the politically and culturally dominant Lao people making up approximately 60 percent of the population. Mon-Khmer groups, the Hmong, and other hill tribes, accounting for 40 percent of the population, live in the foothills. It is a member of the Asia-Pacific Trade Agreement, Association of Southeast Asian Nations, East Asia Summit, Laos applied for membership of the World Trade Organization in 1997, on 2 February 2013, it was granted full membership. According to the anti-corruption non-governmental organisation Transparency International, Laos remains one of the most corrupt countries in the world and this has deterred foreign investment and created major problems with the rule of law, including the nations ability to enforce contract and business regulation. This has contributed to a third of the population of Laos currently living below the poverty line. Laos has an economy, with one of the lowest annual incomes in the world. In 2014, the country ranked 141st on the Human Development Index, according to the Global Hunger Index, Laos ranks as the 29th hungriest nation in the world out of the list of the 52 nations with the worst hunger situation. Laos has also had a human rights record. In the Lao language, the name is Muang Lao or Pathet Lao. Stone artefacts including Hoabinhian types have been found at sites dating to the Late Pleistocene in northern Laos, archaeological evidence suggests agriculturist society developed during the 4th millennium BC
34.
Prime Minister of Laos
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The Prime Minister of the Lao Peoples Democratic Republic is the head of government of Laos. It is the highest office within the Central Government, throughout its history the office of Prime Minister has been responsible, at least in theory but not always in practice, for handling Laoss internal policies. The current prime minister is Thongloun Sisoulith, since 20 April 2016 and he is second-ranked in the Political Bureau. The Prime Minister is elected by the proposal of the President of Laos to the National Assembly and is responsible to the National Assembly, finally, the deputies of the National Assembly have the right to question the Prime Minister and other members of government. The Office of the Prime Minister of the Peoples Democratic Republic traces its lineage back to Kaysone Phomvihane, the predecessor office to the Prime Minister of the Peoples Democratic Republic was the Prime Minister of the former Kingdom of Laos. There have been 7 prime ministers of the Peoples Democratic Republic, Political parties Other factions Trivia Between December 1959 to December 1960, Laos had six different Prime Ministers, who were ousted by six successive political coups. List of monarchs of Laos President of Laos
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Thongloun Sisoulith
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Thongloun Sisoulith is a Laotian politician who has been Prime Minister of Laos since 2016. Previously he was Deputy Prime Minister from 2001 to 2016, as well as Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2006 to 2016 and he is a politburo member of the Lao Peoples Revolutionary Party, ranking fourth. He was chosen to become Prime Minister of Laos at the 10th Party Congress on January 23,2016, Sisoulith was born in the Houaphan province of Laos, and he studied at Pedagogical College of Neo Lao Hak Sat in Houaphan from 1962 to 1969. He was further educated in the Soviet Union, in addition to Lao, he speaks Vietnamese, Russian and English. Throughout his years in government he has an extensive list of appointments and he was Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1987 to 1992, Minister of Labour and Social Welfare from 1993 to 1997, and a member of the National Assembly from 1998 to 2000. He became Deputy Prime Minister and President of the State Planning Committee on March 27,2001, world Economic forum biography United Nations biography
36.
Malaysia
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Malaysia is a federal constitutional monarchy located in Southeast Asia. Peninsular Malaysia shares a land and maritime border with Thailand and maritime borders with Singapore, Vietnam, East Malaysia shares land and maritime borders with Brunei and Indonesia and a maritime border with the Philippines and Vietnam. The capital city is Kuala Lumpur, while Putrajaya is the seat of the federal government, with a population of over 30 million, Malaysia is the 44th most populous country. The southernmost point of continental Eurasia, Tanjung Piai, is in Malaysia, located in the tropics, Malaysia is one of 17 megadiverse countries on earth, with large numbers of endemic species. Malaysia has its origins in the Malay kingdoms present in the area which, from the 18th century, the first British territories were known as the Straits Settlements, whose establishment was followed by the Malay kingdoms becoming British protectorates. The territories on Peninsular Malaysia were first unified as the Malayan Union in 1946, Malaya was restructured as the Federation of Malaya in 1948, and achieved independence on 31 August 1957. Malaya united with North Borneo, Sarawak, and Singapore on 16 September 1963 to become Malaysia, less than two years later in 1965, Singapore was expelled from the federation. The country is multi-ethnic and multi-cultural, which plays a role in politics. About half the population is ethnically Malay, with minorities of Malaysian Chinese, Malaysian Indians. The constitution declares Islam the state religion while allowing freedom of religion for non-Muslims, the government system is closely modelled on the Westminster parliamentary system and the legal system is based on common law. The head of state is the king, known as the Yang di-Pertuan Agong and he is an elected monarch chosen from the hereditary rulers of the nine Malay states every five years. The head of government is the prime minister, since its independence, Malaysia has had one of the best economic records in Asia, with its GDP growing at an average of 6. 5% per annum for almost 50 years. The economy has traditionally been fuelled by its resources, but is expanding in the sectors of science, tourism, commerce. Today, Malaysia has a newly industrialised market economy, ranked third largest in Southeast Asia, the name Malaysia is a combination of the word Malay and the Latin-Greek suffix -sia/-σία. The word melayu in Malay may derive from the Tamil words malai and ur meaning mountain and city, land, malayadvipa was the word used by ancient Indian traders when referring to the Malay Peninsula. Whether or not it originated from these roots, the word melayu or mlayu may have used in early Malay/Javanese to mean to steadily accelerate or run. This term was applied to describe the current of the river Melayu in Sumatra. The name was adopted by the Melayu Kingdom that existed in the seventh century on Sumatra
37.
Prime Minister of Malaysia
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It is in practice, the most powerful political position in Malaysia. The Prime Minister has always been from the United Malays National Organisation part of Barisan Nasional since independence, Tunku Abdul Rahman was the Chief Minister of the Federation of Malaya, restyled to Prime Minister of Malaysia on 16 September 1963 after the formation of Malaysia. Federation of Malaya became independent on 31 August 1957, the 6th and current prime minister is Najib Razak, who took office on 3 April 2009. The Yang di-Pertuan Agong on the Prime Ministers advice shall appoint other Ministers from either Dewan Rakyat or Dewan Negara, the Cabinet shall be collectively responsible to Parliament of Malaysia. The members of the Cabinet shall not hold any office of profit and engage in any trade, the Prime Ministers Department is the body and ministry in which the Prime Minister exercises its functions and powers. The Yang di-Pertuan Agongs choice of replacement prime minister will be dictated by the circumstances, the power of the prime minister is subject to a number of limitations. Conventionally, between the dissolution of one Parliament and the convening of the next, the prime minister, from time to time prime ministers are required to leave the country on business and a deputy is appointed to take their place during that time. In the days before jet aeroplanes, such absences could be for extended periods, ismail Abdul Rahman occasionally acted as Acting Prime Minister when Tunku Abdul Rahman and Abdul Razak Hussein was on leave for going abroad. In 1988, when UMNO as the member of the Barisan Nasional coalition was declared unlawful and illegal political party. Ling Liong Sik became the new Chairman of the Barisan Nasional and served as an Acting Prime Minister for a couple of days until the new party, anwar Ibrahim acted as an Acting Prime Minister for two months started from 19 May 1997 as Mahathir Mohamad was on vacation. Colour key, Alliance Party Barisan Nasional Note Prime ministers are granted certain privileges after leaving office at government expense. Former prime ministers continue to be important national figures, the most recently deceased prime minister was Tunku Abdul Rahman, who died on 6 December 1990. Air transports of heads of state and government Official state car Spouse of the Prime Minister of Malaysia Leader of the Opposition Chief Ministers in Malaysia
38.
Mahathir Mohamad
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Mahathir bin Mohamad is a Malaysian politician who was the fourth Prime Minister of Malaysia from 1981 to 2003, making him longest-serving holder of that office. His political career spanned more than 70 years since he first joined a newly-formed UMNO in 1946, born and raised in Alor Setar, Kedah, Mahathir excelled at school and became a medical doctor. He became active in the United Malays National Organisation, Malaysias largest political party and he served one term before losing his seat, subsequently falling out with Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman and being expelled from UMNO. When Abdul Rahman resigned, Mahathir re-entered UMNO and Parliament, and was promoted to the Cabinet, by 1976 he had risen to Deputy Prime Minister, and in 1981 was sworn in as Prime Minister after the resignation of his predecessor, Hussein Onn. During Mahathirs tenure as Prime Minister, Malaysia experienced a period of modernisation and economic growth. Mahathir was a dominant political figure, winning five consecutive general elections, however, his accumulation of power came at the expense of the independence of the judiciary and the traditional powers and privileges of Malaysias royalty. He deployed the controversial Internal Security Act to detain activists, non-mainstream religious figures, as Prime Minister, he was an advocate of third-world development and a prominent international activist. He remains a political figure after his retirement. He became a strident critic of his hand-picked successor Abdullah Badawi in 2006 and later and his son Mukhriz Mahathir was the Chief Minister of Kedah until early 2016. On 29 February 2016, Mahathir Mohamad quit UMNO in light of UMNOs support for the actions of Prime Minister Najib Razak, among the other reasons are the RM2. 6bil and 1Malaysia Development Berhad issues. On 9 September 2016, the Registrar of Societies gave his stamp of approval for Mahathir Mohamad’s new Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia. Mahathir is currently the chairman of the party, Mahathir was born at his parents home in a poor neighbourhood of Alor Setar, the capital of the state of Kedah, British Malaya, on 10 July 1925. Mahathirs birth certificate gives his date of birth as 20 December and he was actually born on 10 July, his biographer Barry Wain explains that 20 December was an arbitrary date. An aspect of Mahathirs birth set him apart, he was not born into the aristocracy or a prominent religious or political family, both parents had been married previously, Mahathir had six half-siblings and two full-siblings. Discipline imposed by his father motivated him to study, and he showed little interest in sports and he won a position in a selective English medium secondary school, having become fluent in English well ahead of his primary school peers. With schools closed during the Japanese occupation of Malaya during World War II, he went into business, first selling coffee and later pisang goreng and other snacks. After the war, he graduated from school with high marks. There he met his wife, Siti Hasmah Mohamad Ali
39.
Myanmar
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Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar and also known as Burma, is a sovereign state in South East Asia bordered by Bangladesh, India, China, Laos and Thailand. About one third of Myanmars total perimeter of 5,876 km, forms an uninterrupted coastline of 1,930 km along the Bay of Bengal, the countrys 2014 census revealed a much lower population than expected, with 51 million people recorded. Myanmar is 676,578 square kilometres in size and its capital city is Naypyidaw and its largest city and former capital city is Yangon. Early civilizations in Myanmar included the Tibeto-Burman-speaking Pyu city-states in Upper Burma, the Pagan Kingdom fell due to the Mongol invasions and several warring states emerged. In the 16th century, reunified by the Taungoo Dynasty, the country was for a period the largest empire in the history of Mainland Southeast Asia. The early 19th century Konbaung Dynasty ruled over an area included modern Myanmar and briefly controlled Manipur. The British invaded Myanmar after three Anglo-Burmese Wars in the 19th century and the became a British colony. Myanmar became an independent nation in 1948, initially as a nation and then, following a coup détat in 1962. For most of its independent years, the country has been engrossed in rampant ethnic strife, during this time, the United Nations and several other organisations have reported consistent and systematic human rights violations in the country. In 2011, the junta was officially dissolved following a 2010 general election. While former military leaders still wield enormous power in the country, there is, however, continuing criticism of the governments treatment of the Muslim Rohingya minority and its poor response to the religious clashes. In the landmark 2015 election, Aung San Suu Kyis party won a majority in both houses, Myanmar is a country rich in jade and gems, oil, natural gas and other mineral resources. In 2013, its GDP stood at US$56.7 billion, the income gap in Myanmar is among the widest in the world, as a large proportion of the economy is controlled by supporters of the former military government. As of 2016, according to the Human Development Index, Myanmar had a level of human development. The renaming remains a contested issue, many political and ethnic opposition groups and countries continue to use Burma because they do not recognise the legitimacy of the ruling military government or its authority to rename the country. The countrys official name is the Republic of the Union of Myanmar. Countries that do not officially recognise that name use the long form Union of Burma instead, in English, the country is popularly known as either Burma or Myanmar /ˈmjɑːnˌmɑːr/. Both these names are derived from the name of the majority Burmese Bamar ethnic group, Myanmar is considered to be the literary form of the name of the group, while Burma is derived from Bamar, the colloquial form of the groups name
40.
Aung San Suu Kyi
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Aung San Suu Kyi is a Burmese politician, diplomat, and author who is the First and incumbent State Counsellor and Leader of the National League for Democracy. The youngest daughter of Aung San, Father of the Nation of modern-day Myanmar, after graduating from the University of Delhi in 1964 and the University of Oxford in 1968, she worked at the United Nations for three years. She married Michael Aris in 1972, and gave birth to two children, Aung San Suu Kyi rose to prominence in the 1988 Uprisings, and became the General Secretary of the newly formed National League for Democracy. In the 1990 elections, NLD won 81% of the seats in Parliament and she had, however, already been detained under house arrest before the elections. She remained under house arrest for almost 15 of the 21 years from 1989 to 2010 and her party boycotted the 2010 elections, resulting in a decisive victory for the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party. Aung San Suu Kyi became a Pyithu Hluttaw MP while her party won 43 of the 45 vacant seats in the 2012 by-elections and she is an honorary citizen of many countries, including Canada, and was an honorary member of Nelson Mandelas Elders. The Burmese refer to her as Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Daw, literally meaning aunt, is not part of her name but is a Burmese honorific for any older and revered woman, akin to Madame. Burmese sometimes address her as Daw Suu or Amay Suu, Aung San Suu Kyi was born on 19 June 1945 in Rangoon, British Burma. According to Peter Popham, she was born in a village outside Rangoon called Hmway Saung. Her father, Aung San, founded the modern Burmese army and negotiated Burmas independence from the British Empire in 1947 and she grew up with her mother, Khin Kyi, and two brothers, Aung San Lin and Aung San Oo, in Rangoon. Aung San Lin died at the age of eight, when he drowned in a lake on the grounds of the house. Her elder brother emigrated to San Diego, California, becoming a United States citizen, after Aung San Lins death, the family moved to a house by Inya Lake where Aung San Suu Kyi met people of various backgrounds, political views and religions. She was educated in Methodist English High School for much of her childhood in Burma and she speaks four languages, Burmese, English, French and Japanese. Suu Kyis mother, Khin Kyi, gained prominence as a figure in the newly formed Burmese government. She was appointed Burmese ambassador to India and Nepal in 1960 and she studied in the Convent of Jesus and Mary School in New Delhi, and graduated from Lady Shri Ram College in New Delhi with a degree in politics in 1964. Suu Kyi continued her education at St Hughs College, Oxford, obtaining a B. A degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics in 1967, graduating with a third and M. A degree in politics in 1968. After graduating, she lived in New York City with family friend Ma Than E and she worked at the United Nations for three years, primarily on budget matters, writing daily to her future husband, Dr. Michael Aris. On 1 January 1972, Aung San Suu Kyi and Aris, the following year she gave birth to their first son, Alexander Aris, in London, their second son, Kim, was born in 1977
41.
New Zealand
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New Zealand /njuːˈziːlənd/ is an island nation in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The country geographically comprises two main landmasses—the North Island, or Te Ika-a-Māui, and the South Island, or Te Waipounamu—and around 600 smaller islands. New Zealand is situated some 1,500 kilometres east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and roughly 1,000 kilometres south of the Pacific island areas of New Caledonia, Fiji, because of its remoteness, it was one of the last lands to be settled by humans. During its long period of isolation, New Zealand developed a distinct biodiversity of animal, fungal, the countrys varied topography and its sharp mountain peaks, such as the Southern Alps, owe much to the tectonic uplift of land and volcanic eruptions. New Zealands capital city is Wellington, while its most populous city is Auckland, sometime between 1250 and 1300 CE, Polynesians settled in the islands that later were named New Zealand and developed a distinctive Māori culture. In 1642, Dutch explorer Abel Tasman became the first European to sight New Zealand, in 1840, representatives of Britain and Māori chiefs signed the Treaty of Waitangi, which declared British sovereignty over the islands. In 1841, New Zealand became a colony within the British Empire, today, the majority of New Zealands population of 4.7 million is of European descent, the indigenous Māori are the largest minority, followed by Asians and Pacific Islanders. Reflecting this, New Zealands culture is derived from Māori and early British settlers. The official languages are English, Māori and New Zealand Sign Language, New Zealand is a developed country and ranks highly in international comparisons of national performance, such as health, education, economic freedom and quality of life. Since the 1980s, New Zealand has transformed from an agrarian, Queen Elizabeth II is the countrys head of state and is represented by a governor-general. In addition, New Zealand is organised into 11 regional councils and 67 territorial authorities for local government purposes, the Realm of New Zealand also includes Tokelau, the Cook Islands and Niue, and the Ross Dependency, which is New Zealands territorial claim in Antarctica. New Zealand is a member of the United Nations, Commonwealth of Nations, ANZUS, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Pacific Islands Forum, and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation. Dutch explorer Abel Tasman sighted New Zealand in 1642 and called it Staten Landt, in 1645, Dutch cartographers renamed the land Nova Zeelandia after the Dutch province of Zeeland. British explorer James Cook subsequently anglicised the name to New Zealand, Aotearoa is the current Māori name for New Zealand. It is unknown whether Māori had a name for the country before the arrival of Europeans. Māori had several names for the two main islands, including Te Ika-a-Māui for the North Island and Te Waipounamu or Te Waka o Aoraki for the South Island. Early European maps labelled the islands North, Middle and South, in 1830, maps began to use North and South to distinguish the two largest islands and by 1907, this was the accepted norm. The New Zealand Geographic Board discovered in 2009 that the names of the North Island and South Island had never been formalised and this set the names as North Island or Te Ika-a-Māui, and South Island or Te Waipounamu
42.
Prime Minister of New Zealand
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The Prime Minister of New Zealand is the head of government of New Zealand. The current prime minister is Bill English of the National Party, the prime minister is the most senior government minister, and chairs cabinet meetings. The office exists by a convention, which originated in New Zealands former colonial power. The convention stipulates that the Governor-General of New Zealand must select as prime minister the person most likely to command the confidence of the House of Representatives and this individual is typically the leader of the political party that holds the largest number of seats in that chamber. The title prime minister had made its first formal appearance in the 1873 Schedule of the Civil List Act and this was changed in 1869 to premier. That title remained in use for more than 30 years, being changed by Richard Seddon to prime minister in 1901 during his tenure in office. Following the declaration of New Zealand as a dominion in 1907, the office of prime minister is not defined by codified laws, but by unwritten customs known as constitutional conventions which developed in Britain and were replicated in New Zealand. The Prime Minister is leader of the cabinet, and takes a coordinating role, the Cabinet Manual 2008 provides an outline of the prime ministers powers and responsibilities. The post of minister is, like other ministerial positions. However, the convention has long since established that the prime minister must have. Historically, this has meant that the prime minister is the parliamentary leader of the largest political party in the House of Representatives. By constitutional convention, the minister holds formal power to advise the sovereign. As head of government, the prime minister alone has the right to advise the governor-general to, Appoint, dismiss, call elections by advising the governor-general to dissolve parliament. The governor-general may reject the advice to dissolve parliament if the minister has recently lost a vote of confidence. The prime minister is regarded by convention as first among equals and they do hold the most senior post in government, but are also required to adhere to any decisions taken by cabinet, as per the convention of cabinet collective responsibility. The ability to appoint and dismiss ministers, furthermore, the MMP electoral system has complicated this, as the prime minister may have to consult with another party leader. The influence a prime minister is likely to have as leader of the dominant party and these powers may give more direct control over subordinates than is attached to the prime ministers role. The power gained simply from being central to most significant decision-making, in addition, like all other ministers and members of parliament, the prime minister receives annual allowances for travel and lodging, as do the prime ministers spouse and children
43.
Jacinda Ardern
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Jacinda Kate Laurell Ardern is a New Zealand politician and a member of the Labour Partys shadow cabinet. She was first elected to parliament as a list MP at the 2008 general election and she is currently the MP for Mt Albert, and the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party. Born in Hamilton, Ardern grew up in Morrinsville and Murupara and she attended the University of Waikato, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications. She joined the Labour Party at an age, and became a senior figure in the Young Labour Party. After graduating from Waikato University, she spent time working in the offices of Phil Goff and she later spent time in London, working as a senior policy advisor. In early 2008 she won election as the President of the International Union of Socialist Youth, Ardern was raised a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints but left the church in 2005 because it conflicted with her political views. After a high placement on Labours party list for the 2008 election Ardern returned from London to campaign full-time and she also became the Partys candidate for the Waikato electorate. Ardern was unsuccessful in the vote, but was elected as a List MP. Upon election, she became the youngest sitting MP in Parliament, succeeding fellow Labour MP Darren Hughes, Labour Parliamentary leader Phil Goff appointed Ardern as Labours spokesperson for Youth Affairs and as associate spokesperson for Justice. Jacinda Ardern has featured as a panel guest on the TVNZ show Back Benches, the episodes panel comprised young members of various political parties. On 19 November 2008, shortly after the 2008 general election and she featured again on Wednesday 23 June 2010, shortly after the shadow cabinet reshuffle, in which Ardern had no portfolio change. She has also made appearances on TVNZs Breakfast programme as part of the Young Guns feature. Ardern contested the high-profile Auckland Central seat for Labour in the 2011 general election, standing against incumbent National MP Nikki Kaye for National, despite targeting Green voters to vote strategically for her, she did not succeed in her bid to unseat Kaye, losing by 717 votes. However, she returned to Parliament via the party list and she maintained an office within the electorate while a listed MP based in Auckland Central. After Goff resigned from the Party leadership following his defeat at the 2011 election and she was elevated to the fourth-ranking position in the Shadow Cabinet on 19 December 2011, becoming Spokesperson for Social Development under new leader David Shearer. Ardern announced that she intended to put forward her name for the Labour nomination for the Mount Albert by-election, when nominations for the Labour Party closed on 12 January 2017, Ardern was the only nominee and selected unopposed. She was confirmed as Labours candidate at a meeting on 22 January, Ardern won a landslide victory, gaining 77 percent of votes cast in the preliminary results. On 7 March 2017 she was elected as deputy leader of the Labour Party
44.
Philippines
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The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is a sovereign island country in Southeast Asia situated in the western Pacific Ocean. It consists of about 7,641 islands that are categorized broadly under three main geographical divisions from north to south, Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao, the capital city of the Philippines is Manila and the most populous city is Quezon City, both part of Metro Manila. The Philippines has an area of 300,000 square kilometers, and it is the eighth-most populated country in Asia and the 12th most populated country in the world. As of 2013, approximately 10 million additional Filipinos lived overseas, multiple ethnicities and cultures are found throughout the islands. In prehistoric times, Negritos were some of the archipelagos earliest inhabitants and they were followed by successive waves of Austronesian peoples. Exchanges with Chinese, Malay, Indian, and Islamic nations occurred, then, various competing maritime states were established under the rule of Datus, Rajahs, Sultans or Lakans. The arrival of Ferdinand Magellan in Homonhon, Eastern Samar in 1521 marked the beginning of Hispanic colonization, in 1543, Spanish explorer Ruy López de Villalobos named the archipelago Las Islas Filipinas in honor of Philip II of Spain. With the arrival of Miguel López de Legazpi from Mexico City, in 1565, the Philippines became part of the Spanish Empire for more than 300 years. This resulted in Roman Catholicism becoming the dominant religion, during this time, Manila became the western hub of the trans-Pacific trade connecting Asia with Acapulco in the Americas using Manila galleons. Aside from the period of Japanese occupation, the United States retained sovereignty over the islands until after World War II, since then, the Philippines has often had a tumultuous experience with democracy, which included the overthrow of a dictatorship by a non-violent revolution. It is a member of the United Nations, World Trade Organization, Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum. It also hosts the headquarters of the Asian Development Bank, the Philippines was named in honor of King Philip II of Spain. Spanish explorer Ruy López de Villalobos, during his expedition in 1542, named the islands of Leyte, eventually the name Las Islas Filipinas would be used to cover all the islands of the archipelago. Before that became commonplace, other such as Islas del Poniente. The official name of the Philippines has changed several times in the course of its history, during the Philippine Revolution, the Malolos Congress proclaimed the establishment of the República Filipina or the Philippine Republic. From the 1898 Treaty of Paris, the name Philippines began to appear, since the end of World War II, the official name of the country has been the Republic of the Philippines. The metatarsal of the Callao Man, reliably dated by uranium-series dating to 67,000 years ago is the oldest human remnant found in the archipelago to date and this distinction previously belonged to the Tabon Man of Palawan, carbon-dated to around 26,500 years ago. Negritos were also among the archipelagos earliest inhabitants, but their first settlement in the Philippines has not been reliably dated, there are several opposing theories regarding the origins of ancient Filipinos
45.
President of the Philippines
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The President of the Philippines is the head of state and head of government of the Philippines. The President leads the executive branch of the Philippine government and is the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, Filipinos refer to their President as Pangulo or Presidente. The President serves a single, fixed, six-year term without possibility of re-election, in Filipino, one of the two official languages of the Philippines, the President is referred to as Pangulo. In the other languages of the Philippines such as the Visayan languages. Depending on the chosen for these terms, a number of persons could alternatively be considered the inaugural holder of the office. Andrés Bonifacio could be considered the first President of a united Philippines since he was the third Supreme President of the Katipunan and its Supreme Council, led by the Supreme President, coordinated provincial and district councils. When the Katipunan started a revolt against the Spanish colonial government in August 1896. While the term Katipunan remained, Bonifacios government was known as the Tagalog Republic. Bonifacios revolutionary government never controlled territory for any significant period. Some historians contend that including Bonifacio as a past president would imply that Macario Sacay, in March 1897, during the Philippine Revolution against Spain Emilio Aguinaldo was elected president of the revolutionary government at the Tejeros Convention. The new government was meant to replace the Katipunan, though the latter was not formally abolished until 1899, Aguinaldo was again elected President at Biak-na-Bato in November, leading the Republic of Biak-na-Bato. Aguinaldo therefore signed the Pact of Biak-na-Bato and went into exile in Hong Kong at the end of 1897, in April 1898, the Spanish–American War broke out, and the Asiatic Squadron of the United States Navy sailed for the Philippines. At the Battle of Manila Bay on May 1,1898 the American Navy decisively defeated the Spanish Navy effectively ending Spanish rule in the Philippines, aquinaldo subsequently returned to the Philippines aboard a U. S. Navy vessel and renewed the revolution. He formed a government on May 24,1898 and issued the Philippine Declaration of Independence on June 12,1898. On June 23,1898, Aguinaldo transformed his government into a revolutionary government. On January 23,1899, he was then elected President of the First Philippine Republic, consequently, this government is also called the Malolos Republic. The First Philippine Republic was short-lived and never internationally recognized, the Philippines was transferred from Spanish to American control by the Treaty of Paris of 1898, signed in December of that year. The Philippine–American War broke out between the United States and Aguinaldos government and his government effectively ceased to exist on April 1,1901, after he pledged allegiance to the United States following his capture by U. S. forces in March
46.
Rodrigo Duterte
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Rodrigo Rody Roa Duterte, also known as Digong, is a Filipino politician and jurist who is the 16th and current President of the Philippines. He is the first Mindanaoan to hold the office, and the fourth of Visayan descent, at 71 years old, Duterte is the oldest person to assume the Philippine presidency, eclipsing Sergio Osmeñas age of 65. Duterte studied political science at the Lyceum of the Philippines University, graduating in 1968, Duterte was among the longest-serving mayors in the Philippines, serving seven terms totaling more than 22 years in office. Duterte has alternately confirmed and denied his involvement in the killings, Duterte has repeatedly confirmed that he personally killed three kidnapping suspects while Mayor of Davao in 1988. On May 9,2016, Duterte won the Philippine presidential election with 38. 5% of the votes and his domestic policy has focused on combating illegal drug trade by initiating the Philippine Drug War. He has vowed to pursue an independent foreign policy, Duterte was born on March 14,1945, in Maasin. His maternal grandfather was a Chinese immigrant from Xiamen, Fujian and his father was Vicente G. Duterte, a Cebuano lawyer, and his mother Soledad Duterte, was a school teacher from Cabadbaran, Agusan and a civic leader of Maranao descent. Dutertes father was acting mayor of Danao, Cebu and subsequently the governor of Davao province. Rodrigos cousin Ronald, on the hand, served as Cebu City mayor from 1983 to 1986. Ronalds father, Ramon Duterte, also held the position from 1957 to 1959, the Dutertes consider the Cebu-based political families of the Durano and the Almendras clan as relatives. Duterte also has relatives from the Roa clan in Leyte through his mothers side, before they resettled to Davao, Dutertes family briefly lived in his birthplace in Maasin, Leyte, and in his fathers hometown in Danao, Cebu, until he was four years old. The Dutertes initially moved to Mindanao in 1948 but still went back and they finally settled in the Davao Region in 1950. Vicente as a lawyer engaged in practice, while Soledad taught in public schools as a teacher. Mrs Duterte, however, retired as a supervisor in 1952 when her lawyer-husband entered politics there, Duterte went to Laboon Elementary School in Maasin, for a year. He spent his elementary days at the Santa Ana Elementary School in Davao City. He graduated in 1968 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in science at the Lyceum of the Philippines in Manila. He obtained a law degree from San Beda College of Law in 1972, in the same year, he passed the bar exam. Duterte has said that he was abused by a priest when he was a minor
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Malaysia
Philippines
Singapore
Thailand
Vietnam
Indonesia
Cambodia
Brunei
Myanmar (Burma)
Laos
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