Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe is a landlocked country located in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the southwest, Zambia to the north, and Mozambique to the east. The capital and largest city is Harare. The second largest city is Bulawayo. In Zimbabwe, a country of approximately 15 million people, there are 16 official languages, of which English, Shona and Ndebele are the most spoken.

Since the 11th century, the region that is now Zimbabwe has been home to several organized states and kingdoms such as the kingdoms of Rosvi, Mutapa and Mtwakazi, and has also been a major route of migration and trade. Cecil Rhodes' British South African company first demarcated the present territory in 1890 when they conquered Mashonaland, and then in 1893 after bitter resistance from the Matabele people known as the First Matabelian War. The company's reign ended in 1923 with the formation of Southern Rhodesia as a self-governing British colony. In 1965, the conservative government of the white minority unilaterally declared the independence of Rhodesia.

The state survived international isolation and 15 years of guerrilla warfare with black nationalist forces; this led to a peace agreement that established universal suffrage and de jure sovereignty for Zimbabwe in April 1980. Zimbabwe then joined the Commonwealth of Nations, which was suspended in 2002 for violations of international law by its then government under Robert Mugab, and from which it withdrew in December 2003. The sovereign state is a member of the United Nations, the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the African Union (AU) and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA). It was once known as the "Pearl of Africa" ​​for its prosperity.

Robert Mugabe became Prime Minister of Zimbabwe in 1980 when his ZANU-PF party won elections after the end of the white minority rule; he was President of Zimbabwe from 1987 until his resignation in 2017. Under Mugabe's authoritarian regime, the state security apparatus dominated the country and was responsible for widespread human rights violations. The country has been in economic downturn since the 1990s, along the way through multiple crises and hyperinflation.

On November 15, 2017, after more than a year of protests against his government as well as Zimbabwe's plummeting economy, Mugabe was placed under house arrest by the country's national army in a coup d'état and eventually resigned six days later. Emmerson Mnangagwa has since served as President of Zimbabwe.