IRELAND

Ireland is an island in north-western Europe which has been divided politically since 1920. The Republic of Ireland is a nation state of Western Europe.

MACAU

Macau is a city with two faces. On the one hand, the fortresses, churches and food of its former colonial master Portugal speak to a uniquely Mediterranean style on the China coast. On the other, Macau is the self-styled Las Vegas of the East. And while that comparison might sound overblown, it’s not. During the past few years charismatic-but-sleepy little Macau has experienced the sort of boom usually associated with cities like Shànghǎi. But rather than skyscrapers and office towers, the construction here is all about Vegas-style mega-casinos and hotels. The reason, of course, is that casinos are legal in Macau, while in China and nearby Hong Kong they’re not. It’s a big market…

MALAYSIA

Malaysia is a federation of thirteen states in Southeast Asia. The country consists of two geographical regions divided by the South China Sea: a) Peninsular Malaysia (or West Malaysia) on the Malay Peninsula shares a land border on the north with Thailand and is connected by the Johor-Singapore Causeway and the Malaysia-Singapore Second Link to the south with Singapore. It consists of nine sultanates (Johor, Kedah, Kelantan, Negeri Sembilan, Pahang, Perak, Perlis, Selangor and Terengganu), two states headed by governors (Malacca and Penang), and two federal territories (Putrajaya and Kuala Lumpur). b) Malaysian Borneo (or East Malaysia) occupies the northern part of the island of Borneo, bordering Indonesia and surrounding the Sultanate of Brunei. It consists of the states of Sabah and Sarawak and the federal territory of Labuan.

MALDIVES

The Maldives or Maldive Islands, officially the Republic of Maldives, is an island nation consisting of a group of atolls stretching south of India's Lakshadweep islands between the Minicoy and the Chargos archipelagoes, and about seven hundred kilometres (435 mi) south-west of Sri Lanka in the Laccadive Sea of Indian Ocean. The twenty-six atolls of Maldives encompass a territory featuring 1,192 islets, two hundred and fifty islands of which are inhabited.

MEXICO

The United Mexican States is a country located in North America. It is bounded on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the North Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of Mexico. The United Mexican States comprise a constitutional republican federation of thirty-one states and a federal district, Mexico City, one of the most populous cities on Earth. Covering almost 2 million square kilometers, Mexico is the fifth-largest country in the Americas by total area and 14th largest in the world. With a population of almost 109 million, it is the 11th most populous country and the most populous Spanish-speaking country in the world. As the only Latin American member of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) since 1994, Mexico is firmly established as an upper middle-income country. Elections held in July 2000 marked the first time that an opposition party won the presidency to the Institutional Revolutionary Party that held it since 1929, culminating a process of political alternation that had begun at the local level since the 1980s.