Hamid Karzai
President of the Afghan Transitional Authority

(pronounced "HA-mehd CAHRZ-eye")

"Having experienced the ravages of war for 23 years and having been taken hostage by a group of terrorists, we are once again free to determine our destiny."

The Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, located in Central Asia, is a landlocked nation slightly smaller than Texas. It has a total land area of 647,500 sq km (250,001 sq mi). It is bordered on the north by the former Soviet republics of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan, on the east and south by Pakistan, and on the west by Iran. A strip of land less than 80 km (50 mi) wide and known as the Wakhan corridor extends to the northeast. It forms a 76-km (47-mi) border with China. The population was estimated in 2002 at 27.7 million, although decades of warfare make accurate population counts impossible. The capital, Kabul, is...