Malta

The most fought-over small island in the Mediterranean, and the most densely populated country in Europe. Malta sits between Sicily and North Africa on the sea's narrowest crossing, and its megalithic temples predate the pyramids and Stonehenge, among the oldest freestanding structures on earth. Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Romans, Arabs, Normans and Aragonese followed. Charles V gave the islands to the Knights Hospitaller in 1530 for a nominal rent of one falcon a year, and the Knights withstood the Ottoman Great Siege of 1565, a four-month assault whose failure checked Ottoman expansion in the western Mediterranean and made the order's reputation. Napoleon took the islands in 1798 and the Maltese revolted and asked for British protection. Malta became the Royal Navy's central Mediterranean base, and was bombed so heavily in 1942 that the whole island was awarded the George Cross, which is on the flag. Independence came in 1964 and the last British forces left in 1979. Maltese is the only Semitic language written in Latin script and an official EU language. Valletta is a World Heritage site. The country has about 540 thousand people on 316 square kilometres. Maltese and English are both official. The archipelago has no rivers or lakes and depends on desalination. Roman Catholicism is the state religion and divorce was legalised only in 2011. The islands appear in Acts as the site of Paul's shipwreck. Malta joined the EU in 2004 and adopted the euro in 2008, and passport sales to investors have drawn repeated objection from Brussels.

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