Indonesia¶

Area

Asia

Indonesia is the largest archipelago in the world, stretching over 4,800 km along the equator from south-east Asia to Australia. The 18,108 islands have a total area of just under 2 million square kilometers with a population just under a quarter million living on about 6,000 of them. Kingdoms based on Hinduism and Buddhism developed on the islands of Sumatra and Java from the 7th to 14th century, and Islam would become dominant after spice-trading Arabs arrived.

A multitude of small states made the area vulnerable to the European invasion that began with the Portuguese in the early 16th century and saw the Dutch controlling most of the archipelago by the 17th century. Plans for independence were hatched with the Japanese while Japan occupied the islands in World War II, and independence was declared near the end of the war in 1945. The Netherlands would fight for four years to regain control, but finally bowed to intense international pressure in 1949 by recognizing Indonesia's autonomy. The original president -- Sukarno -- maintained to power until 1967 when he was ousted by army general Suharto who promised to protect the country against a supposed communist insurrection. Suharto made economic improvements but unfortunately they were not distributed fairly, with a good piece of the wealth going to himself and his family. The initial years of his rule also saw hundreds of thousands of people killed or imprisoned. Suharto was finally thrown out in 1998 by mass revolt and Indonesia had its first direct presidential election in 2004 -- the largest one-day election in the world. Indonesia straddles the edges of three tectonic plates, making it the site of many earthquakes and volcanoes. Indonesia was the site of Krakatoa.

Indonesia on Wikipedia