Georgia ˈdʒɔrdʒə (
Sakartvelo, sɑkʰɑrtʰvɛlɔIPA) is a sovereign state in the
Caucasus region of
Eurasia. Located at
the crossroads of
Western Asia and
Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the
Black Sea, to the north by
Russia, to the south by
Turkey and
Armenia, and to the southeast by
Azerbaijan. The capital of Georgia is
Tbilisi. Georgia covers a territory of 69,700 km², and its population is almost 4.7 million. Georgia is a
unitary,
semi-presidential republic, with the government elected through a
representative democracy.
During the
classical era, independent kingdoms became established in what is now Georgia. The kingdoms of
Colchis and
Iberia adopted Christianity in the early 4th century. A unified Georgia reached the peak of its political and economic strength during the reign of
King David IV and
Queen Tamar in the 11th–12th centuries. At the beginning of the 19th century, Georgia was annexed by the
Russian Empire. After a brief
period of independence following the
Russian Revolution of 1917, Georgia was
occupied by
Soviet Russia in 1921, becoming the
Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic and part of the
Soviet Union. After independence in 1991,
post-communist Georgia suffered from
civil unrest and economic crisis for most of the 1990s. This lasted until the
Rose Revolution of 2003, after which the new government introduced democratic and economic reforms.
Georgia is a member of the
Council of Europe and the
GUAM Organization for Democracy and Economic Development. It contains two
de facto independent regions,
Abkhazia and
South Ossetia, which gained
limited international recognition after the
2008 Russo-Georgian War. Georgia considers the regions to be part of its sovereign territory under Russian military occupation.