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Austria

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Austria, population circa 8 million, is a small landlocked country in Central Europe. It is a federation of nine states. Once the center of power for the large Austro-Hungarian Empire, Austria was reduced to a small republic after its defeat in World War I. Following annexation by Nazi Germany in March 1938 and subsequent occupation by the victorious Allies (April 1945, Austria's May 1955 State Treaty declared the country "permanently neutral" as a condition of Soviet military withdrawal. Neutrality, once ingrained as part of the Austrian cultural identity, has been called into question since the Soviet collapse and Austria's increasingly prominent role in European affairs. A prosperous country, Austria joined the European Union in 1995 and the euro monetary system in 1999.

Capital: Vienna population circa 1.8 million

Language Spoken: German and a large number of dialects. See Austria/Language.

Neighbours: Germany, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Italy, Slovenia, Hungary, Slovakia, Czech Republic.

Currently (2001) there is a right-wing coalition in the government made up of the conservative People's Party (OeVP) and the right-wing Freedom Party (FPOe).

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