asses by 1978 and resulted in a
short-lived civil war that brought the Marxist Sandinista guerrillas
to power in 1979. Nicaraguan aid to leftist rebels in El Salvador
caused the US to sponsor anti-Sandinista contra guerrillas through
much of the 1980s. Free elections in 1990, 1996, and 2001, saw the
Sandinistas defeated, but voting in 2006 announced the return of
former Sandinista President Daniel ORTEGA Saavedra. Nicaragua's
infrastructure and economy - hard hit by the earlier civil war and
by Hurricane Mitch in 1998 - are slowly being rebuilt.

Geography
Nicaragua

Location:

Central America, bordering both the Caribbean Sea and the North
Pacific Ocean, between Costa Rica and Honduras

Geographic coordinates:

13 00 N, 85 00 W

Map references:

Central America and the Caribbean

Area:

total: 129,494 sq km
land: 120,254 sq km
water: 9,240 sq km

Area - comparative:

slightly smaller than the state of New York

Land boundaries:

total: 1,231 km
border countries: Costa Rica 309 km, Honduras 922 km

Coastline:

910 km

Maritime claims:

territorial sea: 12 nm
contiguous zone: 24 nm
continental shelf: natural prolongation

Climate:

tropical in lowlands, cooler in highlands

Terrain:

extensive Atlantic coastal plains rising to central interior
mountains; narrow Pacific coastal plain interrupted by volcanoes

Elevation extremes:

lowest point: Pacific Ocean 0 m
highest point: Mogoton 2,438 m

Natural resources:

gold, silver, copper, tungsten, lead, zinc, timber, fish

Land use:

arable land: 14.81%
permanent crops: 1.82%
other: 83.37% (2005)

Irrigated land:

610 sq km (2003)

Total renewable water resources:

196.7 cu km (2000)

Freshwater withdrawal (domestic/industrial/agricultural):

total: 1.3 cu km/yr (15%/2%/83%)
per capita: 237 cu m/yr (2000)

Natural hazards:

destructive earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides; extremely
susceptible to hurricanes

Environment - current issues:

deforestation; soil erosion; water pollution

Environment - international agreements:

party to: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto
Protocol, Desertification, Endangered Species, Hazardous Wastes, Law
of the Sea, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Wetlands, Whaling
signed, but not ratified: Environmental Modification

Geography - note:

largest country in Central America; contains the largest freshwater
body i