Algeria (official name: People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria) is a country in the Western part
of North Africa. The capital city is Algiers. It is the largest country in Africa.
The name is from the city of Algiers. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea
in the north, Tunisia in the northeast, Libya in the east, Niger in the southeast,
Mauritania and Mali in the southwest, Western Sahara in the west and Morocco in the
northwest.
History]
Algeria has had people since 10.000 BC. This can be seen in Tassili National Park.
By 600-BC, Phoenician were at Tipasa. Muslim Arabs came to Algeria in the mid-7th century.
Many people chose this religion.
The famous mathematician, Fibonacci (1170—1250) lived in Algeria as a teenager. This is where he
learned the Hindu-Arabic number system and realized it was simpler to use.
In the 1500s and 1700s the Spanish Empire ruled a lot of Algeria. Algeria was
made part of the Ottoman Empire in 1517.
Pirates worked from the Barbary Coast. They took people to sell as slaves.
France ruled Algeria starting in 1830. In 1954, the National Liberation Front (Front de Libération
Nationale or FLN) wanted freedom from France. They fought a war. It became independent from
France in July 5, 1962. In 1963 Ahmed Ben Bella became the first President of
Algeria.
The Algerian Civil War started in 1991. It ended in 2002. After many people protested,
like in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, the government stopped the state of emergency on 24
February 2024.
Geography]
A large part of southern Algeria is the Sahara Desert. The Aures and Nememcha mountain
ranges are in the north. The highest point is Mount Tahat (3,003 m).
Languages]
Official languages are Arabic and Berber. French is widely spoken too.
Population]
Algeria’s population is about 39.5 million people. There are over 40 cities with more than
100,000 people.
