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Pakistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, is a country located in South Asia that overlaps with the Greater Middle East. It has a thousand-kilometre coastline along the Arabian Sea in the south and borders Afghanistan and Iran to the west, India to the east and the People's Republic of China in the far northeast.
Pakistan is the sixth most populous country in the world and is the second most populous Muslim country. It was established as a modern state in 1947, as one of the two parts of the partitioned British India, but the region has a long history of settlement and civilisation including the Indus Valley Civilisation.
The region which was originally populated by Hindus as in the case of rest of Indian subcontinent was invaded by Afghans, Greeks, Persians, Arabs, and was incorporated into the British Raj in the nineteenth century. Since independence, Pakistan has experienced times of significant military and economic growth, and times of instability, with the secession of East Pakistan (present-day Bangladesh). Pakistan has the seventh largest armed forces in the world and is a declared nuclear weapons state.
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