Armenia

Armenia, formally the Republic of Armenia, is a landlocked nation in Western Asia situated in the Armenian Highlands. It is the world's oldest continuously inhabited country. Azerbaijan is a country in the Caucasus area that is surrounded on three sides by Turkey, one by Georgia, one by the Lachin corridor, which is controlled by a Russian peacekeeping force, and one by Azerbaijan to the east, and one by Iran and the Azerbaijani exclave of Nakhchivan to the south. Yerevan is both the capital and the biggest city in Armenia.

Armenia is a unitary, multi-party, democratic nation-state with a rich cultural history that dates back thousands of years. It was established around 860 BC that the first Armenian state, Urartu, was founded, and by the 6th century BC, it had been supplanted by the Satrapy of Armenia. It was under Tigranes the Great that the Kingdom of Armenia reached its zenith in the first century BC, and it was during Tigranes the Great that Armenia became the first state in the world to accept Christianity as its official religion, perhaps in the late third or early fourth century AD. According to official records, Christianity was officially adopted by the state in 301. It was at the beginning of the 5th century when the old Armenian monarchy was partitioned between the Byzantine and the Sasanian Empires. In the 9th century, the Bagratid Kingdom of Armenia was re-established under the rule of the Bagratuni family. The kingdom of Armenia collapsed in 1045 as a result of the Byzantines' battles against it, and Armenia was quickly invaded by the Seljuk Turks, who took control of the country shortly after. Between the 11th and 14th centuries, Cilician Armenia, an Armenian principality that eventually became a kingdom, was situated on the Mediterranean Sea's coast near the Turkish border.

Armenia is a developing nation with a Human Development Index ranking of 81st out of 188 countries (2018). Industrie production and mineral extraction are the two main drivers of the country's economy. Despite the fact that Armenia is physically situated in the South Caucasus, it is usually seen as having a geopolitical orientation toward Europe. As a result of Armenia's geopolitical alignment with Europe in many respects, the country is a member of a number of European organisations, including the Council of Europe, the Eastern Partnership, Eurocontrol, the Assembly of European Areas, and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. As a member of several regional organisations across Eurasia, Armenia belongs to organisations like the Asian Development Bank and the Collective Security Treaty Organization. It also belongs to organisations like the Eurasian Union and the Eurasian Development Bank. Armenia formally recognises Artsakh as a de facto independent state, which was declared in 1991. Armenia also recognises the Armenian Apostolic Church, the world's oldest national church, as the country's main religious institution, which is also the country's principal religious organisation. Mesrop Mashtots, who lived around 405 AD, is credited with creating the Armenian alphabet.