Saudi Arabia           Introduction      

Background:        In 1902 Abdul al-Aziz Ibn SAUD captured Riyadh and set out on a 30-year campaign to unify the Arabian peninsula. In the 1930s, the discovery of oil transformed the country. Following Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in 1990, Saudi Arabia accepted the Kuwaiti royal family and 400,000 refugees while allowing Western and Arab troops to deploy on its soil for the liberation of Kuwait the following year. A burgeoning population, aquifer depletion, and an economy largely dependent on petroleum output and prices are all major governmental concerns.

Saudi Arabia           Geography          

Location:         Middle East, bordering the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea, north of Yemen

Geographic coordinates:        25 00 N, 45 00 E

Map references:         Middle East

Area: total:  1,960,582 sq km

land:  1,960,582 sq km

water:  0 sq km

Area - comparative:        slightly more than one-fifth the size of the US

Land boundaries:         total:  4,415 km

border countries:  Iraq 814 km, Jordan 728 km, Kuwait 222 km, Oman 676 km, Qatar 60 km, UAE 457 km, Yemen 1,458 km

Coastline:         2,640 km