New Zealand Army, Royal New Zealand Navy, Royal
New Zealand Air Force

Military manpower - military age: 20 years of age

Military manpower - availability: males age 15-49: 1,000,102 (2001
est.)

Military manpower - fit for military service: males age 15-49:
841,915 (2001 est.)

Military manpower - reaching military age annually: males: 26,480
(2001 est.)

Military expenditures - dollar figure: $883 million (FY97/98)

Military expenditures - percent of GDP: 1.1% (FY97/98)

New Zealand Transnational Issues

Disputes - international: territorial claim in Antarctica (Ross
Dependency)

======================================================================

@Nicaragua

Nicaragua Introduction

Background: Settled as a colony of Spain in the 1520s, Nicaragua
gained its independence in 1821. Violent opposition to governmental
manipulation and corruption spread to all classes 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
and again in 1996 saw the Sandinistas defeated. The country has
slowly rebuilt its economy during the 1990s, but was hard hit by
Hurricane Mitch in 1998.

Nicaragua Geography

Location: Middle 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: continental shelf: natural prolongation

territorial sea: 200 NM

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: 9%

permanent crops: 1%

permanent pastures: 46%

forests and woodland: 27%

other: 17% (1993 est.)

Irrigated land: 880 sq km (1993 e