Asia - Facts & List Of Countries
Asia is the world's largest continent, both by land area and population, consisting of forty nine countries which cover a total land area of 45,036,492 square kilometers.
Asia is home to the world's largest mountain range, the Himalayas, the world's highest mountain, Mount Everest at 8,848 metres high, the world's largest country, the Russian Federation, the world's largest city by population, Tokyo, shown below, the world's largest city by area, Beijing, the world's largest peninsular, the Arabian Peninsular, the world's richest country, Qatar, the world's two most populace countries of China and India and the earth's lowest point, situated at the point of the Dead Sea in Jordan at 423 meters below sea level.
Other world superlatives located in Asia include the world's largest Archipelago, the Malay Archipelago, the world's largest flood plain, situated on the River Ganges estuary in India, the world's largest mangrove forest in Sunderband, Bangladesh, the world's largest single sand dune, the Seif Dune in Saudi Arabia, the world's largest inter tidal wetlands, located on Hiroshima Bay in Japan, the world's largest peat bog, located in Siberia in Russia, the world's largest swamp, also located in Siberia in Russia and the world's largest steppe, the Mongolian Steppe.
Asia is also home to the world's second highest mountain, K2, at 8,611 meters high, the world's second largest desert, the Arabian Desert located in Saudi Arabia and the world's second largest island, New Guinea, although only half of the island is politically located in Asia, with the other half politically located within Oceania.
Asia is bordered by the Indian Ocean to it's south and west, the Pacific Ocean to it's east and the Arctic Ocean to it's north. Other large bodies of water within Asia include the Arabian Sea, the Bay of Bengal, the Caspian Sea, the Red Sea, the South China Sea and the Philippine Sea.
Asia's longest river is the River Yangzte located in China, at 6,300 kilometers long.
Asia covers 8.7% of the world's surface and 30% of the world's land area. Asia spans eleven time zones from UTC + 4 to UTC - 11, and covers sixteen climatic zones.
Asia's largest nation is the Russian Federation at 142.5 million square kilometers, and it's smallest country is the island nation of the Maldives at 394,451 square kilometers.
Asia has twelve land locked countries, Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bhutan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Mongolia, Nepal, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, the largest of which is Kazakhstan, which is also the world's largest land locked country, at 2,717,300 square kilometers.
Asia's largest city, by population, is Tokyo in Japan with a population of 32.4 million people.
Asia's largest city, by area, is Beijing in China, which covers an area of 19,612,368 square kilometers.
There are twelve monarchies situated in Asia - Bahrain, Bhutan, Brunei, Cambodia, Japan, Jordan, Kuwait, Malaysia, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Thailand.
Asia's population is 4.14 billion people, who between them speak thousands of official, regional, minority and national languages from twelve of the world's major language groups. Asia is home to the world's most widely spoken language, Mandarin.
Eight Asian nations are monarchies, Bhutan, Brunei, Japan, Jordan, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Thailand and the United Arab Emirates.
Asia also includes the four highly developed economies known as the Four Asian Tigers. These economies include the island state of Taiwan, which is officially known as the Republic of China, the Republic of South Korea, the island city state of Singapore and the special administrative region of China known as Hong Kong Island.
Listed below are Asia's forty nine countries complete with land area, capital city, approximate population, official language, currency, internet TLD and international telephone calling code.
The continent has it's own patron saint, St Frances Xavier whose feast day is held on the third of December.
AFGHANISTAN - 652,225 sq km - Kabul - 20,141,000 - Dari / Pashtu - Afghani - .af 93.
ARMENIA - 29,800 sq km - Yerevan - 3,599,000- Armenian - Dram - .am 374.
AZERBAIJAN - 86,600 sq km - Baku - 7,499,000 - Azeri - Manat - .az 994.
BAHRAIN - 691 sq km - Manama - 586,000 - Arabic - Dinar - .bh 973.
BANGLADESH - 143,998 sq km - Dhaka - 120,433,000 - Bengali - Taka - .bd 880.
BHUTAN - 46,620 sq km - Thimphu - 1,638,000 - Dzongkha - Ngultrum - .bt 975.
BRUNEI - 5,765 sq km - Bandar Seri Begawan - 285,000 - Malay - Rupee - .bn 673.
CAMBODIA - 181,000 sq km - Phnom Penh - 9,836,000 - Khmer - Riel - .kh 855.
CHINA - 9,560,900 sq km - Beijing - 1,221,462,000 - Mandarin - Yuan - .cn 86.
EAST TIMOR - 14,874 sq km - Dili - 857,000 - Portugese - Rupiah - .tp 670.
GEORGIA - 69,700 sq km - Tblisi - 5,457,000 - Georgian - Lari - .ge 995.
INDIA - 3,287,263 sq km - New Delhi - 935,744,000 - Hindi - Rupee - .in 91.
INDONESIA - 1,919,445 sq km - Jakarta - 194,564,000 - Indonesian - Rupiah - .id 62.
IRAN - 1,648,000 sq km - Tehran - 67,283,000 - Farsi- Rial - .ir 98.
IRAQ - 438,317 sq km - Baghdad - 20,449,000 - Arabic - Dinar - .iq 964.
ISRAEL - 20,770 sq km - Jerusalem - 5,545,000 - Hebrew - Shekel - .il 972.
JAPAN - 377,727 sq km - Tokyo - 125,197,000 - Japanese - Yen - .jp 81.
JORDAN - 89,206 sq km - Amman - 5,439,000 - Arabic - Dinar - .jo 962.
KAZAKSTAN - 2,717,300 sq km - Astana - 16,590,000 - Kazakh - Tanga - .kz 7
KUWAIT - 17,818 sq km - Kuwait - 1,691,000 - Arabic - Dinar - .kw 965.
KYRGYZSTAN - 198,500 sq km - Bishtek - 4,882,000 - Kirghiz - Som - .kg 996.
LAOS - 236,800 sq km. - Vientiane - 4,668,000 - Lao - Kip - .la 856.
LEBANON - 10,452 sq km - Beirut - 3,009,000 - Arabic - Pound - .lb 961.
MALAYSIA - 332,965 sq km - Kuala Lumpur - 20,140,000 - Malay - Dollar - .my 60.
MALDIVES - 298 sq km - Male - 254,000 - Divehi - Rufiyaa - .mw 960.
MONGOLIA - 1,565,000 sq km - Ulan Bator - 2,410,000 - Khalka - Tugrik - .mn 976.
MYANMAR - 676,577 sq km - Napyadaw - 46,527,000 - Burmese - Kyat - .mm
NEPAL - 147,181 sq km - Kathmandu - 21,918,000 - Nepalise - Rupee - .np 977.
NORTH KOREA - 120,538 sq km - Pyongyang - 23,917,000 - Korean - Won - .kp 850.
OMAN - 271,950 sq km - Muscat - 2,163,000 - Arabic - Rial - .om 968.
PALESTINE - 6,000 sq km - Gaza City - 4,136,450 - Egyptian Pound - Arabic - .ps 970.
PAKISTAN - 803,940 sq km - Islamabad - 129,808,000 - Urdu - Rupee - .pk 92.
PALAU - 497 sq km - Koror - 17,000 - Palauan - Dollar - .pw 680.
PHILIPPINES - 300,000 sq km - Manila - 70,267,000 - Filipino - Peso - .ph 63.
QATAR - 11,437 sq km - Doha - 551,000 - Arabic - Riyal - .qa 974.
RUSSIA (in Asia) - 13,119,600 sq km - Moscow - 148,141,000 - Russian - Rubel - .ru 7.
SAUDI ARABIA - 2,200,000 sq km - Riyadh - 17,880,000 - Arabic - Riyal - .sa 966.
SINGAPORE - 710 sq km - Singapore - 2,987,000- Chinese - Dollar - .sg 65.
SOUTH KOREA - 99,274 sq km - Seoul - 44,851,000 - Korean - Won - .kr 82.
SRI LANKA - 65,610 sq km - Colombo - 18,354,000 - Sinhalese - Pound - .lk 94.
SYRIA - 185,180 sq km - Damascus - 14,186,000 - Arabic - Dollar - .sy 963.
TAIWAN - 36,179 sq km - Taipei - 21,211,000 - Chinese - Dollar - .tw 886.
TAJIKSTAN - 143,100 sq km - Dushanbe - 5,836,000 - Tajik - Rouble - .tj 992.
THAILAND - 513,115 sq km - Bangkok - 59,401,000 - Thai - Bhat - .th 66.
TURKEY - 779,452 sq km - Ankara - 61,644,000 - Turkish - Lira - .tr 90.
TURKMENISTAN - 488,100 sq km - Askhabad - 4,099,000- Turkmen - Manat - .tm 993.
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES - 77,700 sq km - Abu Dhabi - 2,314,000- Arabic - Dirham - .ae 971.
UZBEKISTAN - 447,400 sq km - Tashkent - 22,843,000 - Uzbek - Som - .uz 998.
VIETNAM - 329,565 sq km - Hanoi - 74,545,000 - Vietnamese - Dong - .vn 84.
YEMEN - 527,968 sq km - San' a - 14,501,000 - Arabic - Rial - .ye 967.
