Zimbabwe
/zɪmˈbɑːbweɪ/- a landlocked country in SE Africa, divided from Zambia by the Zambezi River; pop. 11,392, 600 (est. 2009); languages, English (official), Shona, Ndebele, and others; capital, Harare.津巴布韦（非洲东南部内陆国家, 赞比西河将其与赞比亚相隔, 2009年估计人口11,392, 600; 语言有英语［官方语言］、修纳语、恩德比利语等, 首都哈拉雷）。
Formerly known as Southern Rhodesia, the country was a self-governing British colony from 1923. In 1965 the white minority government of the colony (then called Rhodesia) issued a unilateral declaration of independence (UDI) under its Prime Minister, Ian Smith. Despite UN sanctions, illegal independence lasted until 1979, when the Lancaster House Agreement led to all-party elections (1980) and black majority rule under Robert Mugabe. The country then became an independent republic and a member of the Commonwealth. In 2002, following controversial election widely regarded as undemocratic: as a result Zimbabwe was suspended from the Commonwealth for twelve months, and then chose to withdraw.
派生词
Zimbabwean
/-weɪən/ adjective & noun词源
from Shona dzimbabwe 'walled grave'， originally referring to Great Zimbabwe, a complex of stone ruins in one of the country's fertile valleys， the remains of a city at the centre of a flourishing civilization in the 14th and 15th centuries.