Wikijunior:Europe/Belgium
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Belgium is a small country in northern and western Europe. It shares borders with France, the Netherlands, Germany and Luxembourg. The capital city is Brussels. Other big cities are Antwerp and Liège.
[edit] Belgium's History
Belgium got independent in 1830. Before that date the country was a part of the Low Countries, an historical region corresponding to the modern states of the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg. This group of states is now called Benelux. The Low Countries used to be a set of feudal states between the Holly German Empire and France with different degree of autonomy. At the end of the Middle Age, the region was economically and culturally flourishing. However several wars between the Dutch, the Spaniards, the English, the French, the Germans and the Austrians plundered the country.
After independence the country became a center of the Industrial Revolution in Europe and participated to the colonization of Africa. During the first half of the twentieth century the country became prosperous again. However the oil crisis of the seventies put the country (and in particular its southern part Wallonia) into an enduring economical crisis.
