Marshall Islands

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The Republic of Marshall Islands ( ) is an island nation in Middle Oceania. It includes the archipelago of the same name, which belongs to Micronesia. With a population of almost 43,000 on an area of only 181 square kilometres, the Marshall Islands are among the smallest countries in the world. The Republic with Majuro as its capital is linked to the United States by an association agreement. Official languages are Marshallese and English. Until independence on October 21, 1986, the islands were a U.S.-controlled UN trust territory. The more than 1000 islands protrude on average only two meters above sea level, which makes them very vulnerable to ocean rise caused by climate change. The island nation also includes the Eniwetok Atoll and the Bikini Atoll, which were used for nuclear weapons tests.

Country name
The original name of the Marshall Islands is jolet jen Anij, ‘Gifts from God’. They bear their European name after Captain John Marshall, who visited them in 1788 as the first Englishman. The appointment was made a few years later by the Russian officer Adam Johann von Krusenstern.

Territory
The Marshall Islands lie between 4° and 15° north latitude and 160° and 173° east longitude in the western Pacific Ocean, about halfway between Hawaii and Australia. They belong to the island region of Micronesia. Neighboring states are Nauru and Kiribati in the south and the Federated States of Micronesia in the west. North is the Wake Atoll, a disputed outskirts of the United States to which the Republic of the Marshall Islands claims.

The Marshall Islands consist of two almost parallel island chains or Atoll chains: the Ratak chain (Sunrise Islands) with 14 atolls and two islands to the east, and the Ralik chain (Sunset Islands) with 15 atolls and three islands to the west. Together, these are 29 atolls, around 1225 larger and smaller islands and 870 reefs with a total land area of 181.48 km2. The country’s exclusive economic zone covers a sea area of 1,990,530 km2.

In the Ralik chain lies the largest atoll, Kwajalein, with a land area of 16.39 km2, which encloses a lagoon of 2174 km2 in size. This makes it the world's largest coral atoll with the largest enclosed lagoon. The atoll comprises a total of 97 islands. Of them, the island of the same name Kwajalein is the southernmost and with an area of 3.1 km2 the largest. Its neighbor is Ebeye, the most densely populated island of the Marshall Islands with 9614 inhabitants on 31 hectares (as of 2011).

The cornerstones of the Marshall Islands are:

Northernmost point: Bokak Atoll (Taongi), Ratak chain
East point: Knox-Atoll, Ratak chain
Southernmost point: Ebon Atoll, Ralik chain
West Point: Ujelang Atoll, Ralik Chain

Physical Geography

Geology and geomorphology
The formation of the Marshall Islands followed the usual pattern of the West Pacific Islands: A