Malta

Malta is a Southern European island country consisting of an archipelago in the Mediterranean Sea.It lies 80 km south of Italy, 284 km east of Tunisia, and 333 km north of Libya. The country covers just over 316 sq km  with a population of just under 450,000, making it one of the world’s smallest and most densely populated countries. The capital of Malta is Valletta, which at 0.8 sq km, is the smallest national capital in the European Union by area. Malta has two official languages, which are Maltese and English. However, the Maltese language is also regarded as the national language of the island. Malta’s location in the middle of the Mediterranean has historically given it great strategic importance as a naval base, and a succession of powers, including the Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Normans, Sicilians, Spanish, French, and British have ruled the islands. Malta is an archipelago in the central Mediterranean, some 80 km south of the Italian island of Sicily. Only the three largest islands  Malta, Gozo and Comino are inhabited. The smaller islands are uninhabited.