Bolivia

Bolivia (officially The Plurinational State of Bolivia), is a landlocked country located in western-central South America. The capital is Sucre, while the seat of government and financial center is located in La Paz. The largest city and principal industrial center is Santa Ccruz de la Sierra, located on the Llanos Orientales (tropical lowlands), a mostly flat region in the east of the country. It shares it's borders with Brazil,  Peru,  Argentina,  Chile and  Paraguay.

Appearance
Indigenous Bolivian men are known for wearing homemade cotton trousers, brightly colored ponchos and woolen caps called chullas. Sandals are the traditional footwear but many go barefoot, even in the cold. This is how he is most often presented.

Personality
Bolivia's personality is quite similar to the innocent personality of Paraguay or Peru. Bolivia is latecomer. They're even late for important celebrations. Often then they tells false justification to the people they were supposed to meet, that 'something important happened to them'. This is because they know that they won't come on time, but they don't want to disappoint the other person. Rarely does what they promise and fulfills their promises. They often can't say 'no'. They thinks boggles that they couldn't oppose the authorities. They're hypocrite and two-faced. They will never say person that they disagree with something, and behind their back they don't stop at anything and don't show the slightest objection. They're not honest, sometimes they're afraid to tell the truth.

Interests
They like sand boarding and also watch cholita wrestling.

Flag Meaning
The national flag of Bolivia, strongly inspired by the colors of the Inca Empire, was originally adopted in 1851. The state flag and ensign (and war flag) is a horizontal tricolor of red, yellow and green with the Bolivian coat of arms in the center. According to one source, the red stands for Bolivia's brave soldiers, while the green symbolizes ferility and yellow the nation's mineral deposits.

Others Symbols
The national flowers are Patujú Bandera and Kantuta Tricolor. Mint - symbol of mineral wealth of the country.

Nicknames
Their name was "Upper Peru", in the past.

Etymology
Bolivia is named after Simón Bolívar, a Venezuelan leader in the Spanish American wars of independence.

Origin Of Language
The official language is Spanish, but the main indigenous languages are Quechua, Aymara and Guaraní.

Pre-Colonial
The region now known as Bolivia had been occupied for over 2,500 years when the Aymara arrived. However, present-day Aymara associate themselves with the ancient civilization of the Tiwanaku culturewhich had its capital at Tiwanaku in Western Bolivia. The capital city of Tiwanaku dates from as early as 1500 BC when it was a small, agriculturally based village.

The community grew to urban proportions between AD 600 and AD 800, becoming an important regional power in the southern Andes. According to early estimates, the city covered approximately 6.5 square kilometers (2.5 square miles) at its maximum extent and had between 15,000 and 30,000 inhabitants. In 1996 satelite imaging was used to map the extent of fossilized suka kollus (flooded raised fields) across the three primary valleys of Tiwanaku, arriving at population-carrying capacity estimates of anywhere between 285,000 and 1,482,000 people.

Around AD 400, Tiwanaku went from being a locally dominant force to a predatory state. Tiwanaku expanded its reaches into the Yungas and brought its culture and way of life to many other cultures in Peru, Bolivia, and Chile. Tiwanaku was not a violent culture in many respects. In order to expand its reach, Tiwanaku exercised great political astuteness, creating colonies, fostering trade agreements (which made the other cultures rather dependent), and instituting state cults.

The empire continued to grow with no end in sight. William H. Isbell states "Tiahuanaco underwent a dramatic transformation between AD 600 and 700 that established new monumental standards for civic architecture and greatly increased the resident population." Tiwanaku continued to absorb cultures rather than eradicate them. Archaeologists note a dramatic adoption of Tiwanaku ceramics into the cultures which became part of the Tiwanaku empire. Tiwanaku's power was further solidified through the trade it implemented among the cities within its empire.

Tiwanaku's elites gained their status through the surplus food they controlled, collected from outlying regions and then redistributed to the general populace. Further, this elite's control of llama herds became a powerful control mechanism as llamas were essential for carrying goods between the civic centre and the periphery. These herds also came to symbolize class distinctions between the commoners and the elites. Through this control and manipulation of surplus resources, the elite's power continued to grow until about AD 950. At this time a dramatic shift in climate occurred, causing a significant drop in precipitation in the Titicaca Basin, believed by archaeologists to have been on the scale of a major drought.

As the rainfall decreased, many of the cities farther away from Lake Titicaca began to tender fewer foodstuffs to the elites. As the surplus of food decreased, and thus the amount available to underpin their power, the control of the elites began to falter. The capital city became the last place viable for food production due to the resiliency of the raised field method of agriculture. Tiwanaku disappeared around AD 1000 because food production, the main source of the elites' power, dried up. The area remained uninhabited for centuries thereafter.

Between 1438 and 1527, the Inca empire, during its expansion from its capital at Cuzco, Peru. It gained control over much of what is now Andean Bolivia and extended its control into the fringes of the Amazon basin.

Colonial Period
The Spanish conquest of the Inca empire began in 1524, and was mostly completed by 1533. The territory now called Bolivia was known as Charcas, and was under the authority of the Viceroy of Lima. Local government came from the Audiencia de[1]Charcas located in Chuquisaca (La Plata—modern Sucre). Founded in 1545 as a mining town, Potosi soon produced fabulous wealth, becoming the largest city in the New World with a population exceeding 150,000 people.

By the late 16th century, Bolivian silver was an important source of revenue for the Spanish Empire. A steady stream of natives served as labor force under the brutal, slave conditions of the Spanish version of the pre-Columbian draft system called the mita. Charcas was transferred to the Viceroyalty[2]of the Rio da la Plata in 1776 and the people from Buenos Aires, the capital of the Viceroyalty, coined the term "Upper Peru" (Spanish Alto Perú) as a popular reference to the Royal Audiencia of Charcas. Tupac Karati led the indigenous rebellion that laid siege to La Paz in March 1781, during which 20,000 people died. As Spanish royal authority weakened during the Napoleonic Wars, sentiment against colonial rule grew.

Independence And Subsequent Wars
The struggle of independence started in the city of Sucre on 25 May 1809 and the Chuquisaca Revolution (Chuquisaca was then the name of the city) is known as the first cry of Freedom in Latin America. That revolution was followed by the La Paz revolution on 16 July 1809. The La Paz revolution marked a complete split with the Spanish government, while the Chuquisaca Revolution established a local independent junta in the name of the Spanish King deposed by Napoleon Bonaparte. Both revolutions were short-lived and defeated by the Spanish authorities in the Viceroyalty of the Rio de La Plata, but the following year the Spanish American wars of independence raged across the continent.

Bolivia was captured and recaptured many times during the war by the royalists and patriots. Buenos Aires sent three military campaigns, all of which were defeated, and eventually limited itself to protecting the national borders at Salta. Bolivia was finally freed of Royalist dominion by Marshal Antonio Jose de Sucre, with a military campaign coming from the North in support of the campaign of Simóm Bolivar. After 16 years of war the Republic was proclaimed on 6 August 1825.

In 1836, Bolivia, under the rule of Marshal Anders de Santa Cruz, invaded Peru to reinstall the deposed president, General Luis Jose de Orbegoso. Peru and Bolivia formed the Peru-Bolivian Confederation, with de Santa Cruz as the Supreme Protector. Following tension between the Confederation and Chile, Chile declared war on 28 December 1836. Argentina separately declared war on the Confederation on 9 May 1837. The Peruvian-Bolivian forces achieved several major victories during the War of the Confederation: the defeat of the Argentine expedition and the defeat of the first Chilean expedition on the fields of Paucartapa near the city of Arequipa.

At the outset of the war, the Chilean and Peruvian rebel army surrendered unconditionally and signed the Paucarpata Treaty. The treaty stipulated that Chile would withdraw from Peru-Bolivia, Chile would return captured Confederate ships, economic relations would be normalized, and the Confederation would pay Peruvian debt to Chile. In Chile, the government and public rejected the peace treaty. Chile organized a second attack on the Confederation and defeated it in the Battle of Yunagy. After this defeat, Santa Cruz resigned and went to exile in Ecuador and then Paris, and the Peruvian-Bolivian Confederation was dissolved.

Following the renewed independence of Peru, Peruvian president General Agustín Gamarra invaded Bolivia on november 18 1841, the battle de Ingavi took place, in which the Bolivian Army defeated the Peruvian troops of Gamarra (Killed in the battle). After the victory, Bolivia invades Perú, several fronts of struggle are opened in the Peruvian south.

The eviction of the Bolivian troops in the south of Peru would be achieved by the greater availability of material and human resources of Peru, the Bolivian Army did not have enough troops to maintain the occupation. In the district of Locumba - Tacna, a column between Peruvian soldiers and peasants defeated a Bolivian regiment in the so-called Battle of Los Altos de Chipe (Locumba). In the district of Sama and in Arica, the Peruvian colonel José María Lavayén organizes a troop that manages to defeat the Bolivian forces of Colonel Rodríguez Magariños which dislodges the port of Arica. The battle of Tarapacá of 1842, Peruvian militias formed by the commander Juan Buendía, defeated on January 7, 1842, the detachment led by Colonel bolivian José María García, who died in the confrontation. Thus, the Bolivian troops leave Tacna, Arica and Tarapacá in February of 1842, retreating towards Moquegua and Puno. The combats of Motoni and Orurillo expelled and subsequently initiated the withdrawal of Bolivian forces occupying Peruvian territory, threatening again Bolivia to suffer an invasion.

At the end of the war, the Treaty of Puno was signed on June 7, 1842. However, the climate of tension between Lima and La Paz would continue until 1847, when the signing of a Peace and Trade Treaty became effective.

The estimated population of the main three cities in 1843 was La Paz 300,000, Cochabamba 250,000 and Potosi 200,000.

A period of political and economic instability in the early-to-mid-19th century weakened Bolivia. In addition, during the War of the Pacific (1879–83), Chile occupied vast territories rich in natural resources south west of Bolivia, including the Bolivian coast. Chile took control of today's Chuquicamata area, the adjoining rich salitre (saltpeper) fields, and the port of Antofagasts among other Bolivian territories.

Thus, since independence, Bolivia has lost over half of its territory to neighboring countries. Through diplomatic channels in 1909, it lost the basin of the Madre de Dios River and the territory of the Purus in the Amazon, yielding 250,000 km² to Peru. It also lost the state of Acre, in the Acre War, important because this region was known for its production of rubber. Peasants and the Bolivian army fought briefly but after a few victories, and facing the prospect of a total war against Brazil, it was forced to sign the Treaty og Pertrópolis in 1903, in which Bolivia lost this rich territory. Popular myth has it that Bolivian president Mariano Melgarejo (1864–71) traded the land for what he called "a magnificent white horse" and Acre was subsequently flooded by Brazilians, which ultimately led to confrontation and fear of war with Brazil. In the late 19th century, an increase in the world price of silver brought Bolivia relative prosperity and political stability.

Geography
Bolivia is located in the central zone of South America, between 57°26'–69°38'W and 9°38'–22°53'S. With an area of 1,098,581 square kilometres (424,164 sq mi), Bolivia is the world's 28th-largest country, and the fifth largest country in South America, extending from the Central Andes through part of the Gran Chaco, Pantanal and as far as the Amazon. The geographic center of the country is the so-called Puerto Estrella ("Star Port") on the Rio Grande, in Ñuflo de Chavez Province​, Santa Cruz Department.

The geography of the country exhibits a great variety of terrain and climates. Bolivia has a high level of biodervisity, considered one of the greatest in the world, as well as several ecoregions with ecological sub-units such as the Altiplano, tropical rainforest (including Amazon rainforest), dry valleys, and the Chiquitania, which is a tropical savanna. These areas feature enormous variations in altitude, from an elevation of 6,542 metres (21,463 ft) above sea level in Nevado Sajama to nearly 70 metres (230 ft) along the Paraguay River. Although a country of great geographic diversity, Bolivia has remained a landlochek country since the War of the Pacific. Puerto Suarez, San Matias and Puerto Quijarro are located in the Bolivian Pantanal.

Bolivia can be divided into three physiographic regions:

The Andean region in the southwest spans 28% of the national territory, extending over 307,603 square kilometres (118,766 sq mi). This area is located above 3,000 metres (9,800 ft) altitude and is located between two big Andean chains, the Cordillera Occidantal ("Western Range") and the Cordillera Central ("Central Range"), with some of the highest spots in the Americans such as the Nevado Sajama, with an altitude of 6,542 metres (21,463 ft), and the lllimani, at 6,462 metres (21,201 ft). Also located in the Cordillera Central is Lake Titicaca, the highest commercially navigable lake in the world and the largest lake in South America; the lake is shared with Peru. Also in this region are the Altiplano and the Salar de Uyuni, which is the largest saltflat in the world and an important source of lithium.

The Sub-Andean region in the center and south of the country is an intermediate region between the Altiplano and the eastern llanos (plain); this region comprises 13% of the territory of Bolivia, extending over 142,815 km2 (55,141 sq mi), and encompassing the Bolivian valleys and the Yungas region. It is distinguished by its farming activities and its temperate climate.

The Llanos region in the northeast comprises 59% of the territory, with 648,163 km2 (250,257 sq mi). It is located to the north of the Cordillera Central and extends from the Andean foothills to the Paraguay River. It is a region of flat land and small plateaus, all covered by extensive rain forests containing enormous biodiversity. The region is below 400 metres (1,300 ft) above sea level. Bolivia has three drainage basins"

The first is the Amazon Basin, also called the North Basin (724,000 km2 (280,000 sq mi)/66% of the territory). The rivers of this basin generally have big meanders which form lakes such asMurillo Lake in Pando Department. The main Bolivian tributary to the Amazon basin is the Mamore River, with a length of 2,000 km (1,200 mi) running north to the confluence with the Beni River, 1,113 km (692 mi) in length and the second most important river of the country. The Beni River, along with the Madeira River, forms the main tributary of the Amazon River. From east to west, the basin is formed by other important rivers, such as the Madre de Dios River, the Orthon River, the Abuna RIver, the Yata River, and the Guapore Lake. The most important lakes are Rogaguando Lake, Rogagua Lake, and Jara Lake.

The second is the Rio de la Plata Basin, also called the South Basin (229,500 km2 (88,600 sq mi)/21% of the territory). The tributaries in this basin are in general less abundant than the ones forming the Amazon Basin. The Rio de la Plata Basin is mainly formed by the Paraguay River, Pilcomayo River, and Bermejo River. The most important lakes are Uberaba Lake and Mandiore Lake, both located in the Bolivian marshland. The third basin is the Central Basin, which is an endorheic basin (145,081 square kilometres (56,016 sq mi)/13% of the territory). The Altiplano has large numbers of lakes and rivers that do not run into any ocean because they are enclosed by the Andean mountains. The most important river is the Desaguadero River, with a length of 436 km (271 mi), the longest river of the Altiplano; it begins in Lake Titicaca and then runs in a southeast direction to Poopó Lake The basin is then formed by Lake Titicaca, Lake Poopó, the Desaguadero River, and great salt flats, including the Salar de Uyuni and Coipasa Lake.

Family

 * Spain - parent
 * Portugal - grandparent
 * Argentina - sibling
 * Brazil - sibling-in-law or cousin
 * Chile - sibling
 * Colombia - sibling
 * Cuba - sibling
 * Dominican Republic - sibling
 * East Timor - cousin
 * Ecuador - sibling
 * El Salvador - sibling
 * Equatorial Guinea - sibling
 * Guatemala - sibling
 * Honduras - sibling
 * Jamaica - sibling
 * Mexico - sibling
 * Nicaragua - sibling
 * Venezuela - sibling
 * Philippines - stepsibling
 * Puerto Rico - sibling
 * United States - sibling

Friends

 * China
 * Russia
 * North Korea
 * Iran
 * Syria

Neutral

 * Vatican City
 * Argentina
 * Peru

Enemies
Israel
 * Chile
 * United States
 * United Kingdom
 * France
 * Germany
 * Spain
 * Portugal
 * Netherlands
 * Belgium
 * Luxembourg
 * Poland
 * Italy
 * Taiwan
 * South Korea
 * Canada
 * Ukraine
 * Spanish Empire (formerly)