native name | |
---|---|
conventional long name | Republic of Colombia |
common name | Colombia |
image coat | Coat of arms of Colombia.svg |
national motto | "Libertad y Orden""Liberty and Order" |
national anthem | O unfading glory! |
capital | Bogotá, D.C. |
largest city | capital |
official languages | Spanish(English is also official in San Andrés and Providence islands) |
regional languages | The 72 languages and dialects of ethnic groups are also official in their regions. |
ethnic groups | 58% Mestizo 26% White15% Afro Colombian1% Amerindian |
demonym | Colombian |
government type | Unitary presidential republic |
leader title1 | President |
leader name1 | Juan Manuel Santos |
leader title2 | Vice President |
leader name2 | Angelino Garzón |
sovereignty type | Independence |
sovereignty note | From Spain |
established event1 | Declared |
established date1 | July 20, 1810 |
established event2 | Recognized |
established date2 | August 7, 1819 |
established event3 | Current constitution |
established date3 | 1991 |
area rank | 26th |
area magnitude | 1 E12 |
area km2 | 1,141,748 |
area sq mi | 440,831 |
percent water | 8.8 (17th) |
population estimate | 45,925,397 |
population estimate rank | 27th |
population estimate year | August 2012 |
population census | 46'406.352 |
population census year | 2005 |
population density km2 | 40,74 |
population density sq mi | 15.72 |
population density rank | 172th |
gdp ppp | $435.367 billion |
gdp ppp rank | 28th |
gdp ppp year | 2010 |
gdp ppp per capita | $9,566 |
gdp ppp per capita rank | 83rd |
gdp nominal | $285.511 billion |
gdp nominal rank | 35th |
gdp nominal year | 2010 |
gdp nominal per capita | $6,273 |
gini | 58.5 |
gini year | 2006 |
gini category | high |
hdi | 0.689 |
hdi rank | 79th |
hdi year | 2010 |
hdi category | high |
hpi | 67.2 |
hpi rank | 2nd |
hpi year | 2006 |
hpi category | medium |
currency | Peso |
currency code | COP |
country code | CO |
utc offset | -5 |
drives on | Right |
date format | dd-mm-yyyy (CE) |
cctld | .co |
calling code | +57 |
footnote1 | Although the Colombian Constitution specifies Spanish as the official language in all its territory, the native languages (approximately 88 dialects) are also official in the whole country. |
footnote2 | The official Colombian time, (horalegal.sic.gov.co) is controlled and coordinated by the state agency Superintendency of Industry and Commerce. }} |
The territory of what is now "Colombia" was originally inhabited by indigenous people including the Muisca, Quimbaya, and Tairona. The Spanish arrived in 1499 and initiated a period of conquest and colonization creating the Viceroyalty of Peru, and to create a better management of tax in 1717 was created the Viceroyalty of New Granada (comprising modern-day Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, the northwest region of Brazil and Panama) with its capital in Bogotá. Independence from Spain was won in 1819 by Simón Bolívar, but by 1830 "Gran Colombia" had collapsed with the secession of Venezuela and Ecuador. What is now Colombia and Panama emerged as the Republic of New Granada. The new nation experimented with federalism as the Granadine Confederation (1858), and then the United States of Colombia (1863), before the Republic of Colombia was finally declared in 1886. Panama seceded in 1903 under pressure to fulfill financial responsibilities towards the United States government to build the Panama Canal.
Colombia was the first constitutional government of South America, which was declared in 1811 and is the only South American country that has never had a coup. The Liberal and Conservative parties, founded in 1848 and 1849 respectively, are two of the oldest surviving political parties in the Americas. However, tensions between the two have frequently erupted into violence, most notably in the Thousand Days War (1899–1902) and La Violencia, beginning in 1948. Since the 1960s, government forces, left-wing insurgents and right-wing paramilitaries have been engaged in the continent's longest-running armed conflict. Fuelled by the cocaine trade, this escalated dramatically in the 1980s. Nevertheless, in the recent decade (2000s) the violence has decreased significantly. Many paramilitary groups have demobilized as part of a controversial peace process with the government, and the guerrillas have lost control in many areas where they once dominated. Meanwhile Colombia's homicide rate, for many years one of the highest in the world, almost halved between 2002 and 2006. 2009 and 2010 saw an increase in the urban homicide rate, particularly in the city of Medellín, attributed to gang warfare and paramilitary successor groups. According to the Maplecroft research institute, in 2010 Colombia had the world's sixth highest risk of terrorism.
Colombia is a standing middle power with the fourth largest economy in Latin America. Inequality and unequal distribution of wealth are widespread. In 1990, the ratio of income between the poorest and richest 10 per cent was 40-to-one. Following a decade of economic restructuring and a recession, this ratio had climbed to 80-to-one in the year 2000. By 2009, Colombia had reached a Gini coefficient of 0.587, which was the highest in Latin America. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, "there has been a decrease in the poverty rate in recent years, but around half of the population continues to live under the poverty line" as of 2008–2009. Official figures for 2009 indicate that about 46% of Colombians lived below the poverty line and some 17% in "extreme poverty".
Colombia is very ethnically diverse, and the interaction between descendants of the original native inhabitants, Spanish colonists, Africans brought as slaves and twentieth-century immigrants from Europe and the Middle East has produced a rich cultural heritage. Heritage which has contributed to making this country the richest in folk rhythms (with 165 reported) and various cultural events. This has also been influenced by Colombia's varied geography. The majority of the urban centres are located in the highlands of the Andes mountains, but Colombian territory also encompasses Amazon rainforest, tropical grassland and both Caribbean and Pacific coastlines. Ecologically, Colombia is one of the world's 17 megadiverse countries and is considered the most megadiverse per square kilometer.
In 1835, when Venezuela and Ecuador broke away, the Cundinamarca region that remained became a new country – the Republic of New Granada. In 1858 New Granada officially changed its name to the Granadine Confederation, then in 1863 the United States of Colombia, before finally adopting its present name – the Republic of Colombia – in 1886.
Part of the Ring of Fire, a region of the world subject to earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, Colombia is dominated by the Andes mountains. Beyond the Colombian Massif (in the south-western departments of Cauca and Nariño) these are divided into three branches known as cordilleras (mountain ranges): the Cordillera Occidental, running adjacent to the Pacific coast and including the city of Cali; the Cordillera Central, running between the Cauca and Magdalena river valleys (to the west and east respectively) and including the cities of Medellín, Manizales, Pereira and Armenia; and the Cordillera Oriental, extending north east to the Guajira Peninsula and including Bogotá, Bucaramanga and Cúcuta. Peaks in the Cordillera Occidental exceed , and in the Cordillera Central and Cordillera Oriental they reach . At , Bogotá is the highest city of its size in the world.
East of the Andes lies the savanna of the Llanos, part of the Orinoco River basin, and, in the far south east, the jungle of the Amazon rainforest. Together these lowlands comprise over half Colombia's territory, but they contain less than 3% of the population. To the north the Caribbean coast, home to 20% of the population and the location of the major port cities of Barranquilla and Cartagena, generally consists of low-lying plains, but it also contains the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta mountain range, which includes the country's tallest peaks (Pico Cristóbal Colón and Pico Simón Bolívar), and the Guajira Desert. By contrast the narrow and discontinuous Pacific coastal lowlands, backed by the Serranía de Baudó mountains, are covered in dense vegetation and sparsely populated. The principal Pacific port is Buenaventura.
Colombian territory also includes a number of Caribbean and Pacific islands.
Human induced deforestation has substantially changed the Andean landscape and has started to creep into the rainforests of Amazonia and the Pacific coast. Deforestation is also linked to the conversion of lowland tropical forests to oil palm plantations. However, compared to neighbouring countries rates of deforestation in Colombia are still relatively low. In urban areas, the use of fossil fuels, and other human produced waste have contaminated the local environment. Demand from rapidly expanding cities has placed increasing stress on the water supply as watersheds are affected and ground water tables fall. Nonetheless, Colombia has large reserves of freshwater and is the fourth country in the world by magnitude of total freshwater supply.
Participants in the country's armed conflict have also contributed to the pollution of the environment. Illegal armed groups have deforested large areas of land to plant illegal crops, with an estimated 99,000 hectares used for the cultivation of coca in 2007, while in response the government has fumigated these crops using hazardous chemicals. Insurgents have also destroyed oil pipelines creating major ecological disasters.
=== Pre-Colombian era ===
Approximately 10,000 BC, hunter-gatherer societies existed near present-day Bogotá (at "El Abra" and "Tequendama") which traded with one another and with cultures living in the Magdalena River Valley. Beginning in the first millennium BC, groups of Amerindians developed the political system of "cacicazgos" with a pyramidal structure of power headed by caciques. Within Colombia, the two cultures with the most complex cacicazgo systems were the Tayronas in the Caribbean Region, and the Muiscas in the highlands around Bogotá, both of which were of the Chibcha language family. The Muisca people are considered to have had one of the most developed political systems in South America, after the Incas.
Alonso de Lugo (who had sailed with Columbus) reached the Guajira Peninsula in 1500. Santa Marta was founded in 1525, and Cartagena in 1533. Gonzalo Jiminez de Quesada led an expedition to the interior in 1535, and founded the "New City of Granada", the name soon changed to "Santa Fé de Bogotá." Two other notable journeys by Spaniards to the interior took place in the same period. Sebastian de Belalcazar, conqueror of Quito, traveled north and founded Cali in 1536 and Popayán in 1537; Nicolas Federman crossed Llanos Orientales and went over the Eastern Cordillera.
The territory's main population was made up of hundreds of tribes of the Chibchan and Carib, currently known as the Caribbean people, whom the Spaniards conquered through warfare and alliances, while resulting disease such as smallpox, and the conquest and ethnic cleansing itself caused a demographic reduction among the indigenous people. In the 16th century, Europeans began to bring slaves from Africa.
Since the beginning of the periods of Conquest and Colonization, there were several rebel movements under Spanish rule, most of them either being crushed or remaining too weak to change the overall situation. The last one which sought outright independence from Spain sprang up around 1810, following the independence of St. Domingue in 1804 (present-day Haiti), who provided a non-negligible degree of support to the eventual leaders of this rebellion: Simón Bolívar and Francisco de Paula Santander.
A movement initiated by Antonio Nariño, who opposed Spanish centralism and led the opposition against the viceroyalty, led to the independence of Cartagena in November 1811. This led to the formation of two independent governments which fought a civil war, a period known as La Patria Boba. The following year Nariño proclaimed the United Provinces of New Granada, headed by Camilo Torres Tenorio. Despite the successes of the rebellion, the emergence of two distinct ideological currents among the liberators (federalism and centralism) gave rise to an internal clash between these two, thus contributing to the reconquest of territory by the Spanish, allowing restoration of the viceroyalty under the command of Juan de Samano, whose regime punished those who participated in the uprisings. This stoked renewed rebellion, which, combined with a weakened Spain, made possible a successful rebellion led by Simón Bolívar, who finally proclaimed independence in 1819. The pro-Spanish resistance was finally defeated in 1822 in the present territory of Colombia and in 1823 in Venezuela.
The territory of the Viceroyalty of New Granada became the Republic of Colombia organized as a union of Ecuador, Colombia and Venezuela (Panama was then an integral part of Colombia). The Congress of Cucuta in 1821 adopted a constitution for the new Republic. The first President of Colombia was the Venezuelan-born Simón Bolívar, and Francisco de Paula Santander was Vice President. However, the new republic was very unstable and ended with the rupture of Venezuela in 1829, followed by Ecuador in 1830.
Internal political and territorial divisions led to the secession of Venezuela and Quito (today's Ecuador) in 1830. The so-called "Department of Cundinamarca" adopted the name "Nueva Granada", which it kept until 1856 when it became the "Confederación Granadina" (Granadine Confederation). After a two-year civil war in 1863, the "United States of Colombia" was created, lasting until 1886, when the country finally became known as the Republic of Colombia. Internal divisions remained between the bipartisan political forces, occasionally igniting very bloody civil wars, the most significant being the Thousand Days civil war (1899–1902).
This, together with the United States of America's intentions to influence the area (especially the Panama Canal construction and control) led to the separation of the Department of Panama in 1903 and the establishment of it as a nation. The United States paid Colombia $25,000,000 in 1921, seven years after completion of the canal, for redress of President Roosevelt's role in the creation of Panama, and Colombia recognized Panama under the terms of the Thomson-Urrutia Treaty. Colombia was engulfed in the Year-Long War with Peru over a territorial dispute involving the Amazonas Department and its capital Leticia.
Soon after, Colombia achieved a relative degree of political stability, which was interrupted by a bloody conflict that took place between the late 1940s and the early 1950s, a period known as La Violencia ("The Violence"). Its cause was mainly mounting tensions between the two leading political parties, which subsequently ignited after the assassination of the Liberal presidential candidate Jorge Eliécer Gaitán on April 9, 1948. This assassination caused riots in Bogotá and became known as El Bogotazo. The violence from these riots spread throughout the country and claimed the lives of at least 180,000 Colombians.
From 1953 to 1964 the violence between the two political parties decreased first when Gustavo Rojas deposed the President of Colombia in a coup d'état and negotiated with the Guerrillas, and then under the military junta of General Gabriel París Gordillo.
After Rojas' deposition the two political parties Colombian Conservative Party and Colombian Liberal Party agreed to the creation of a "National Front", whereby the Liberal and Conservative parties would govern jointly. The presidency would be determined by an alternating conservative and liberal president every 4 years for 16 years; the two parties would have parity in all other elective offices. The National Front ended "La Violencia", and National Front administrations attempted to institute far-reaching social and economic reforms in cooperation with the Alliance for Progress. In the end, the contradictions between each successive Liberal and Conservative administration made the results decidedly mixed. Despite the progress in certain sectors, many social and political problems continued, and guerrilla groups were formally created such as the FARC, ELN and M-19 to fight the government and political apparatus. Emerging in the late 1970s, powerful and violent drug cartels further developed during the 1980s and 1990s. The Medellín Cartel under Pablo Escobar and the Cali Cartel, in particular, exerted political, economic and social influence in Colombia during this period. These cartels also financed and influenced different illegal armed groups throughout the political spectrum. Some enemies of these allied with the guerrillas and created or influenced paramilitary groups.
The new Colombian Constitution of 1991 was ratified after being drafted by the Constituent Assembly of Colombia. The constitution included key provisions on political, ethnic, human and gender rights. The new constitution initially prohibited the extradition of Colombian nationals, causing accusations that drug cartels had lobbied for the provision; extradition was allowed again in 1996 when the provision was repealed. The cartels had previously promoted a violent campaign against extradition, leading to many terrorist attacks and mafia-style executions. They also tried to influence the government and political structure of Colombia through corruption, as in the case of the 8000 Process scandal.
In recent years, the country has continued to be plagued by the effects of the drug trade, guerrilla insurgencies like FARC, and paramilitary groups such as the AUC, which along with other minor factions have engaged in a bloody internal armed conflict. President Andrés Pastrana and the FARC attempted to negotiate a solution to the conflict between 1999 and 2002. The government set up a "demilitarized" zone, but repeated tensions and crisis led the Pastrana administration to conclude that the negotiations were ineffectual. Pastrana also began to implement the Plan Colombia initiative, with the dual goal of ending the armed conflict and promoting a strong anti-narcotic strategy.
During the presidency of Álvaro Uribe, the government applied more military pressure on the FARC and other outlawed groups. After the offensive, which was supported by foreign aid provided by the United States, many security indicators improved. Reported kidnappings showed a steep decrease (from 3,700 in the year 2000 to 172 in 2009 (Jan.-Oct.)) and so did intentional homicides (from 28,837 in 2002 to 15,817 in 2009, according to police, while the health system reported a decline from 28,534 to 17,717 during the same period). Kidnappings suffered a steady decline for almost a decade until a 2010 increase saw 280 cases reported between January and October, most of which were concentrated in the Medellín area. According to official statistics, guerrillas were reduced from 24,000 fighters in 2002 to 9,500 in 2010. While rural areas and jungles remained dangerous, the overall reduction of violence led to the growth of internal travel and tourism after security conditions improved.
The 2006–2007 Colombian parapolitics scandal emerged from the revelations and judicial implications of past and present links between paramilitary groups, mainly the AUC, and some government officials and many politicians, most of them allied to the governing administration.
The head of the executive branch is the President of Colombia who serves as both head of state and head of government, followed by the Vice President and the Council of Ministers. The president is elected by popular vote to serve four-year terms and is currently limited to a maximum of two such terms (increased from one in 2005). At the provincial level executive power is vested in department governors, municipal mayors and local administrators for smaller administrative subdivisions, such as corregidores or corregimientos.
The legislative branch of government is composed by the Senate and the House of Representatives. The 102-seat Senate is elected nationally and the Representatives are elected by every region and minority groups. Members of both houses are elected two months before the president, also by popular vote and to serve four-year terms. At the provincial level the legislative branch is represented by department assemblies and municipal councils. All regional elections are held one year and five months after the presidential election. The judicial branch is headed by the Supreme Court, consisting of 23 judges divided into three chambers (Penal, Civil and Agrarian, and Labour). The judicial branch also includes the Council of State, which has special responsibility for administrative law and also provides legal advice to the executive, the Constitutional Court, responsible for assuring the integrity of the Colombian constitution, and the Superior Council of Judicature, responsible for auditing the judicial branch. Colombia operates a system of civil law, which since 2005 has been applied through an adversarial system.
In addition to the capital nine other cities have been designated districts (in effect special municipalities), on the basis of special distinguishing features. These are Barranquilla, Cartagena, Santa Marta, Cúcuta, Popayán, Bucaramanga, Tunja, Turbo, Buenaventura and Tumaco. Some departments have local administrative subdivisions, where towns have a large concentration of population and municipalities are near each other (for example in Antioquia and Cundinamarca). Where departments have a low population and there are security problems (for example Amazonas, Vaupés and Vichada), special administrative divisions are employed, such as "department corregimientos", which are a hybrid of a municipality and a corregimiento.
The foreign affairs of Colombia are headed by the President of Colombia and managed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Colombia has diplomatic missions in all continents and is also represented in multilateral organizations at the following locations:
The foreign relations of Colombia are mostly concentrated on combating the illegal drug trade, the fight against terrorism, improving Colombia's image in the international community, expanding the international market for Colombian products, and environmental issues. Colombia receives special military and commercial co-operation and support in its fight against internal armed groups from the United States, mainly through Plan Colombia, as well as special financial preferences from the European Union in certain products.
Colombia was one of the 12 countries that joined the UNASUR when it was created. UNASUR is supposed to be modeled like the European Union having free trade agreements with the members, free movement of people, a common currency, and also a common passport. Colombia as well as all the other members of UNASUR have had some problems with the integration due to the 2008 Andean diplomatic crisis.
Colombia is a member of the Andean Community of Nations and the Union of South American Nations.
Colombians need tourist visa for 180 countries and do not need tourist visa for 15 countries.
The Colombian military is divided into three branches: the National Army of Colombia; the Colombian Air Force; and the Colombian National Armada. The National Police functions as a gendarmerie, operating independently from the military as the law enforcement agency for the entire country. Each of these operates with their own intelligence apparatus separate from the national intelligence agency, the Administrative Department of Security.
The National Army is formed by divisions, regiments and special units; the National Armada by the Colombian Naval Infantry, the Naval Force of the Caribbean, the Naval Force of the Pacific, the Naval Force of the South, Colombia Coast Guards, Naval Aviation and the Specific Command of San Andres y Providencia; and the Air Force by 13 air units. The National Police has a presence in all municipalities.
For over a century Colombian politics were monopolized by the Liberal Party (founded in 1848 on an anti-clerical, broadly economically liberal and federalist platform), and the Conservative Party (founded in 1849 espousing Catholicism, protectionism, and centralism). This culminated in the formation of the National Front (1958–1974), which formalized arrangements for an alternation of power between the two parties and excluded non-establishment alternatives (thereby fueling the nascent armed conflict).
By the time of the dissolution of the National Front, traditional political alignments had begun to fragment. This process has continued since, and the consequences of this are exemplified by the results of the presidential election of 28 May 2006, which was won with 62% of the vote by the incumbent, Álvaro Uribe. President Uribe was from a Liberal background but he campaigned as part of the Colombia First movement with the support of the Conservative Party, and his hard line on security issues and liberal economics place him on the right of the modern political spectrum.
In second place with 22% was Carlos Gaviria of the Alternative Democratic Pole, a newly formed social democratic alliance which includes elements of the former M-19 guerrilla movement. Horacio Serpa of the Liberal Party achieved third place with 12%. Meanwhile in the congressional elections held earlier that year the two traditional parties secured only 93 out of 268 seats available.
Despite a number of controversies, most notably the ongoing parapolitics scandal, dramatic improvements in security and continued strong economic performance have ensured that former President Álvaro Uribe remained popular among Colombian people, with his approval rating peaking at 85%, according to a poll in July 2008. However, having served two terms, he was constitutionally barred from seeking re-election in 2010. The Colombian Congress, with overwhelming support of the Colombian people, had attempted to hold a referendum allowing a vote that would overturn the 2-term limit for presidents, but this attempt was ruled unconstitutional by the Colombian constitutional court on February 27, 2010. President Uribe stated that he respects the decision, one that cannot be appealed.
On presidential elections performed as of May 30, 2010 people voted 46% for the former Minister of defense Juan Manuel Santos for being the president from 2010 to 2014, but according to the current laws, since he does not have 50% of the votes, there was a second round on June 20, 2010 against the second most voted candidate, Antanas Mockus with 21%. The winning candidate was Juan Manuel Santos, who became Colombia's president beginning on August 7, 2010.
In spite of the difficulties presented by serious internal armed conflict, Colombia's market economy grew steadily in the latter part of the twentieth century, with gross domestic product (GDP) increasing at an average rate of over 4% per year between 1970 and 1998. The country suffered a recession in 1999 (the first full year of negative growth since the Great Depression), and the recovery from that recession was long and painful. However, in recent years growth has been impressive, reaching 8.2% in 2007, one of the highest rates of growth in Latin America. Meanwhile the Colombian stock exchange climbed from 1,000 points at its creation in July 2001 to over 7,300 points by November 2008.
According to International Monetary Fund estimates, in 2010 Colombia's GDP (PPP) was US$429.866 billion (28th in the world and third in South America). Adjusted for purchasing power parity, GDP per capita stands at $6,273, placing Colombia 82nd in the world. However, in practice this is relatively unevenly distributed among the population, and, in common with much of Latin America, Colombia scores poorly according to the Gini coefficient, with UN figures placing it 119th out of 126 countries. In 2003 the richest 20% of the population had a 62.7% share of income/consumption and the poorest 20% just 2.5%, and 17.8% of Colombians live on less than $2 a day.
Government spending is 37.9% of GDP. Almost a quarter of this goes towards servicing the country's relatively high government debt, estimated at 52.8% of GDP in 2007. Other problems facing the economy include weak domestic and foreign demand, the funding of the country's pension system, and unemployment (10.8% in November 2008). Inflation has remained relatively low in recent years, standing at 5.5% in 2007.
Historically an agrarian economy, Colombia urbanised rapidly in the twentieth century, by the end of which just 22.7% of the workforce were employed in agriculture, generating just 11.5% of GDP. 18.7% of the workforce are employed in industry and 58.5% in services, responsible for 36% and 52.5% of GDP respectively. Colombia is rich in natural resources, and its main exports include petroleum, coal, coffee and other agricultural produce, and gold. Colombia is also known as the world's leading source of emeralds, while over 70% of cut flowers imported by the United States are Colombian. Principal trading partners are the United States (a controversial free trade agreement with the United States is currently awaiting approval by the United States Congress), the European Union, Venezuela and China. All imports, exports, and the overall balance of trade are at record levels, and the inflow of export dollars has resulted in a substantial re-valuation of the Colombian peso.
Economic performance has been aided by liberal reforms introduced in the early 1990s and continued during the presidency of Álvaro Uribe, whose policies included measures designed to bring the public sector deficit below 2.5% of GDP. In 2008, The Heritage Foundation assessed the Colombian economy to be 61.9% free, an increase of 2.3% since 2007, placing it 67th in the world and 15th out of 29 countries within the region.
Meanwhile the improvements in security resulting from President Uribe's controversial "democratic security" strategy have engendered an increased sense of confidence in the economy. On 28 May 2007 the American magazine BusinessWeek published an article naming Colombia "the most extreme emerging market on Earth". Colombia's economy has improved in recent years. Investment soared, from 15% of GDP in 2002 to 26% in 2008. private business has retooled. However unemployment at 12 % and the poverty rate at 46% in 2009 are above the regional average.
According to a recent World Bank report, doing business is easiest in Manizales, Ibagué and Pereira, and more difficult in Cali and Cartagena. Reforms in custom administration have helped reduce the amount of time it takes to prepare documentation by over 60% for exports and 40% for imports compared to the previous report. Colombia has taken measures to address the backlog in civil municipal courts. The most important result was the dismissal of 12.2% of inactive claims in civil courts thanks to the application of Law 1194 of 2008 (Ley de Desistimiento Tácito).
For many years serious internal armed conflict deterred tourists from visiting Colombia, with official travel advisories warning against travel to the country. However, in recent years numbers have risen sharply, thanks to improvements in security resulting from President Álvaro Uribe's "democratic security" strategy, which has included significant increases in military strength and police presence throughout the country and pushed rebel groups further away from the major cities, highways and tourist sites likely to attract international visitors. Foreign tourist visits were predicted to have risen from 0.5 million in 2003 to 1.3 million in 2007, while Lonely Planet picked Colombia as one of their top ten world destinations for 2006. In 2010 Colombia received 1,4 million foreign visitors, according to official statistics.
In November 2010 the U.S. State Department travel warning for the country stated that security conditions had improved significantly in recent years and kidnappings had been noticeably reduced from their previous peak, but cautioned travelers about continuing terrorist threats and the dangers of common crime, including hostage-taking. Rising murder rates in Cali and Medellín were also highlighted and U.S. citizens were urged to travel between cities by air instead of using ground transportation.>
Popular tourist attractions include the historic Candelaria district of central Bogotá, the walled city and beaches of Cartagena, the colonial towns of Santa Fe de Antioquia, Popayán, Villa de Leyva and Santa Cruz de Mompox, and the Las Lajas Sanctuary and the Salt Cathedral of Zipaquirá. Tourists are also drawn to Colombia's numerous festivals, including Medellín's Festival of the Flowers, the Barranquilla Carnival, the Carnival of Blacks and Whites in Pasto and the Ibero-American Theater Festival in Bogotá. Meanwhile, because of the improved security, Caribbean cruise ships now stop at Cartagena and Santa Marta.
The great variety in geography, flora and fauna across Colombia has also resulted in the development of an ecotourist industry, concentrated in the country's national parks. Popular ecotourist destinations include: along the Caribbean coast, the Tayrona National Natural Park in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta mountain range and Cabo de la Vela on the tip of the Guajira Peninsula; the Nevado del Ruiz volcano, the Cocora valley and the Tatacoa Desert in the central Andean region; Amacayacu National Park in the Amazon River basin; and the Pacific islands of Malpelo and Gorgona. Colombia is home to seven UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Colombia has a network of national highways maintained by the Instituto Nacional de Vías or INVIAS (National Institute of Roadways) government agency under the Ministry of Transport. The Pan-American Highway travels through Colombia, connecting the country with Venezuela to the east and Ecuador to the south.
Colombia's main airports are El Dorado International Airport in Bogotá, Jose Maria Cordova International Airport in Medellín, Alfonso Bonilla Aragon International Airport in Cali, Rafael Nuñez International Airport in Cartagena, Ernesto Cortissoz International Airport in Barranquilla, and Matecaña International Airport in Pereira. El Dorado International Airport is the busiest airport in Latin America based upon the number of flights and the weight of goods transported. Several national airlines (Avianca, AeroRepública, AIRES, SATENA and EasyFly, ), and international airlines (such as Iberia, American Airlines, Varig, Copa, Continental, Delta, Air Canada, Spirit, Lufthansa, Air France, Aerolíneas Argentinas, Aerogal, TAME, TACA, JetBlue Airways, LAN Airlines) operate from El Dorado. Because of its central location in Colombia and America, it is preferred by national land transportation providers, as well as national and international air transportation providers.
Urban transport systems have been developed in Bogotá and Medellín. Traffic congestion in Bogotá has been greatly exacerbated by the lack of rail transport. However, this problem has been alleviated somewhat by the development of the TransMilenio Bus Rapid System and the restriction of vehicles through a daily, rotating ban on private cars depending on plate numbers. Bogotá's system consists of bus and minibus services managed by both private- and public-sector enterprises. Since 1995 Medellín has had a modern urban railway referred to as the Metro de Medellín, which also connects with the cities of Itagüí, Envigado, and Bello. An elevated cable car system, Metrocable, was added in 2004 to link some of Medellín's poorer mountainous neighborhoods with the Metro de Medellín. A bus rapid-transit system called Transmetro, similar to Bogotá's TransMilenio, will begin operating in Barranquilla by late 2007. Cali's streets remain under construction as a new public-transit system called the Massive Integration of the West is being built.
With an estimated 46 million people in 2008, Colombia is the third-most populous country in Latin America, after Brazil and Mexico. It is also home to the fourth-largest number of Spanish speakers in the world after Mexico, the United States, and Spain. It is slightly ahead of Argentina by almost 6 million people. At the outset of the 20th century, Colombia's population was approximately 4 million. The population increased at a rate of 1.9% between 1975 and 2005, predicted to drop to 1.2% over the next decade. Colombia is projected to have a population of 50.7 million by 2015. These trends are reflected in the country's age profile. In 2005 over 30% of the population was under 15 years old, compared to just 5.1% aged 65 and over.
The population is concentrated in the Andean highlands and along the Caribbean coast. The nine eastern lowland departments, comprising about 54% of Colombia's area, have less than 3% of the population and a density of less than one person per square kilometer (two persons per square mile). Traditionally a rural society, movement to urban areas was very heavy in the mid-twentieth century, and Colombia is now one of the most urbanized countries in Latin America. The urban population increased from 31% of the total in 1938 to 60% in 1975, and by 2005 the figure stood at 72.7%. The population of Bogotá alone has increased from just over 300,000 in 1938 to approximately 8 million today. In total thirty cities now have populations of 100,000 or more. As of 2010 Colombia has the world's largest populations of internally displaced persons (IDPs), estimated up to 4.5 million people.
Colombia is ranked sixth in the world in the Happy Planet Index.
The census data in Colombia does not record ethnicity, other than that of those identifying themselves as members of particular minority ethnic groups, so overall percentages are essentially estimates from other sources and can vary from one to another. According to the CIA World Factbook, the majority of the population (58%) is Mestizo, or of mixed European and Amerindian ancestry. Approximately 20% of the population is of European ancestry (predominantly Spanish, partly Italian, Portuguese, and German). The CIA World Factbook also states that 14% of Colombia's total population is of mixed African and European ancestry, with 3% being of mixed African and Amerindian ancestry, and 4% having primarily African ancestry. Indigenous Amerindians comprise only 1% of the population. Other sources claim that up to 29% of Colombians (13 million people) have some African ancestry.
The overwhelming majority of Colombians speak Spanish (see also Colombian Spanish), but in total 101 languages are listed for Colombia in the Ethnologue database, of which 80 are spoken today. Most of these belong to the Chibchan, Arawak and Cariban language families. The Quechua language, spoken in the Andes region of the country, has also extended more northwards into Colombia, mainly in urban centers of major cities. There are currently about 500,000 speakers of indigenous languages.
Before the Spanish colonization of what is now Colombia, the territory was home to a significant number of indigenous peoples. Many of these were absorbed into the mestizo population, but the remainder currently represents over eighty-five distinct cultures. 567 reserves (resguardos) established for indigenous peoples occupy 365,004 square kilometres (over 30% of the country's total) and are inhabited by more than 800,000 people in over 67,000 families. The 1991 constitution established their native languages as official in their territories, and most of them have bilingual education (native and Spanish).
Some of the largest indigenous groups are the Wayuu, the Arhuacos, the Muisca, the Kuna, the Paez, the Tucano and the Guahibo. Cauca, La Guajira and Guainia have the largest indigenous populations.
The Organización Nacional Indígena de Colombia (ONIC) is an organization representing the indigenous peoples of Colombia, who comprise some 800,000 people or approximately 2% of the population. The organization was founded at the first National Indigenous Congress in 1982.
In 1991, Colombia signed and ratified the current international law concerning indigenous peoples, Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, 1989.
The first and most substantial wave of modern immigration to Colombia consisted of Spanish colonists, following the arrival of Europeans in 1499. However a low number of other Europeans and North Americans migrated to the country in the late 19th and early twentieth centuries, and, in smaller numbers, Poles, Lithuanians, English, Irish, and Croats during and after the Second World War.
Many immigrant communities have settled on the Caribbean coast, in particular recent immigrants from the Middle East. Barranquilla (the largest city of the Colombian Caribbean) and other Caribbean cities have the largest populations of Lebanese and Arabs, Sephardi Jews, Roma. There are also important communities of Chinese and Japanese.
Black Africans were brought as slaves, mostly to the coastal lowlands, beginning early in the 16th century and continuing into the 19th century. Large Afro-Colombian communities are found today on the Caribbean and Pacific coasts. The population of the department of Chocó, running along the northern portion of Colombia's Pacific coast, is over 80% black.
During the 1990s, an estimated 35,000 people died as a result of the armed conflict. Trade unions in Colombia are included among the victimized groups with over 2,800 of their members being murdered between 1986 and 2010.
The National Administrative Department of Statistics (DANE) does not collect religious statistics, and accurate reports are difficult to obtain. However, based on various studies, more than 95% of the population adheres to Christianity, the vast majority of which (between 81% and 90%) are Roman Catholic. About 1% of Colombians adhere to indigenous religions and under 1% to Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism. However, despite high numbers of adherents, around 60% of respondents to a poll by El Tiempo reported that they did not practice their faith actively.
While Colombia remains an overwhelmingly Roman Catholic country, the Colombian constitution guarantees freedom and equality of religion. Religious groups are readily able to obtain recognition as organized associations, although some smaller ones have faced difficulty in obtaining the additional recognition required to offer chaplaincy services in public facilities and to perform legally recognised marriages.
The educational experience of many Colombian children begins with attendance at a preschool academy until age 6 (Educación preescolar). Basic education (Educación básica) is compulsory by law. It has two stages: Primary basic education (Educación básica primaria) which goes from 1st to 5th grade and usually it encompasses children from 6 to 10 years old, and Secondary basic education (Educación básica secundaria), which goes from 6th to 9th grade. Basic education is followed by Middle vocational education (Educación media vocacional) that comprehends 10th and 11th grade. It may have different vocational training modalities or specialties (academic, technical, business, and so on.) according to the curriculum adopted by each school. However in many rural areas, teachers are poorly qualified, and only the five years of primary schooling are offered. The school year can extend from February to November or from August to June, and in many public schools attendance is split into morning and afternoon "shifts", in order to accommodate the large numbers of children.
After the successful completion of all the basic and middle education years, a high-school diploma is granted. The high-school graduate is known as a bachiller, because secondary basic school and middle education are traditionally considered together as a unit called bachillerato (6th to 11th grade). Students in their final year of middle education take the ICFES test in order to gain access to Superior education (Educación superior). This superior education includes undergraduate professional studies, technical, technological and intermediate professional education, and post-graduate studies.
Bachilleres (high-school graduates) may enter into a professional undergraduate career program offered by a university; these programs last up to 5 years (or less for technical, technological and intermediate professional education, and post-graduate studies), even up to 6–7 years for some careers, such as medicine. In Colombia, there is not an institution such as college; students go directly into a career program at a university or any other educational institution to obtain a professional, technical or technological title. Once graduated from the university, people are granted a (professional, technical or technological) diploma and licensed (if required) to practice the career they have chosen. For some professional career programs, students are required to take the SABER-PRO test in their final year of undergraduate academic education.
Public spending on education as a proportion of gross domestic product in 2006 was 4.7% – one of the highest rates in Latin America – as compared with 2.4% in 1991. This represented 14.2% of total government expenditure. In 2006, the primary and secondary net enrollment rates stood at 88% and 65% respectively, slightly below the regional average. School life expectancy was 12.4 years. A total of 92.3% of the population aged 15 and older were recorded as literate, including 97.9% of those aged 15–24, both figures slightly higher than the regional average. However, literacy levels are considerably lower in rural areas.
Historically, the country's imposing landscape left its various regions largely isolated from one another, resulting in the development of very strong regional identities, in many cases stronger than the national. Modern transport links and means of communication have mitigated this and done much to foster a sense of nationhood, but social and political instability, and in particular fears of armed groups and bandits on intercity highways, have contributed to the maintenance of very clear regional differences. Accent, dress, music, food, politics and general attitude vary greatly between the Bogotanos and other residents of the central highlands, the paisas of Antioquia and the coffee region, the costeños of the Caribbean coast, the llaneros of the eastern plains, and the inhabitants of the Pacific coast and the vast Amazon region to the south east.
An inheritance from the colonial era, Colombia remains a deeply Roman Catholic country and maintains a large base of Catholic traditions which provide a point of unity for its multicultural society. Colombia has many celebrations and festivals throughout the year, and the majority are rooted in these Catholic religious traditions. However, many are also infused with a diverse range of other influences. Prominent examples of Colombia's festivals include the Barranquilla Carnival, the Carnival of Blacks and Whites, Medellín's Festival of the Flowers and Bogotá's Ibero-American Theater Festival
The mixing of various different ethnic traditions is reflected in Colombia's music and dance. The most well-known Colombian genres are cumbia and vallenato, the latter now strongly influenced by global pop culture. A powerful and unifying cultural medium in Colombia is television. Notably, the telenovela Betty La Fea has gained international success through localized versions in the United States, Mexico, and elsewhere. Television has also played a role in the development of the local film industry.
As in many Latin American countries, Colombians have a passion for football. The Colombian national football team is seen as a symbol of unity and national pride, though local clubs also inspire fierce loyalty and sometimes-violent rivalries. Colombia has "exported" many players, such as Freddy Rincón, Carlos Valderrama, Iván Ramiro Córdoba, and Faustino Asprilla. Other Colombian athletes have also achieved success, including Formula 1 Racing's Juan Pablo Montoya, Major League Baseball's Edgar Rentería and Orlando Cabrera, and the PGA Tour's Camilo Villegas.
Other famous Colombians include the Nobel Prize winning author Gabriel García Márquez, the artist Fernando Botero, the writers Fernando Vallejo, Laura Restrepo, Álvaro Mutis and James Cañón, the musicians Shakira, Juanes, Carlos Vives and Juan Garcia-Herreros, and the actors Catalina Sandino Moreno, John Leguizamo, Catherine Siachoque and Sofía Vergara.
The Colombian cuisine developed mainly from the food traditions of European countries. Spanish, Italian and French culinary influences can all be seen in Colombian cooking. The cuisine of neighboring Latin American countries, Mexico, the United States and the Caribbean, as well as the cooking traditions of the country's indigenous inhabitants, have all influenced Colombian food. For example, cuy or guinea pig, which is an indigenous cuisine, is eaten in the Andes region of south-western Colombia.
Many national symbols, both objects and themes, have arisen from Colombia's diverse cultural traditions and aim to represent what Colombia, and the Colombian people, have in common. Cultural expressions in Colombia are promoted by the government through the Ministry of Culture.
The depiction of Colombia in popular culture, especially the portrayal of Colombian people in film and fiction, has been asserted by Colombian organizations and government to be largely negative and has raised concerns that it reinforces, or even engenders, societal prejudice and discrimination due to association with narco-trafficking, terrorism and other criminal elements, and poverty. These stereotypes are considered unfair by many Colombians. The Colombian government funded the "Colombia es Pasión" advertisement campaign as an attempt to improve Colombia's image abroad, with mixed results.
Colombia's cuisine, influenced heavily by the Spanish and Indigenous populations, is not as widely known as other Latin American cuisines such as Peruvian or Brazilian, but to the adventurous traveler there are plenty of delectable dishes to try, not to mention fruits, rum, and especially Colombian coffee.
== Related information ==
Category:Andean Community of Nations Category:Caribbean countries Category:Constitutional republics Category:Countries bordering the Pacific Ocean Category:Former Spanish colonies Category:Republics Category:South American countries Category:Spanish-speaking countries Category:States and territories established in 1810 Category:Member states of the Union of South American Nations Category:Member states of the United Nations
ace:Kolombia af:Colombia als:Kolumbien am:ኮሎምቢያ ar:كولومبيا an:Colombia arc:ܩܘܠܘܡܒܝܐ roa-rup:Columbia frp:Colombie ast:Colombia gn:Kolómbia ay:Kuluwya az:Kolumbiya bn:কলম্বিয়া zh-min-nan:Colombia be:Калумбія be-x-old:Калюмбія bcl:Kolombya bo:ཁོ་ལོམ་བི་ཡ། bs:Kolumbija br:Kolombia bg:Колумбия ca:Colòmbia cv:Колумби ceb:Colombia cs:Kolumbie cbk-zam:Colombia co:Colombia cy:Colombia da:Colombia de:Kolumbien dv:ކޮލަންބިއާ nv:Kolámbiya dsb:Kolumbiska dz:ཀོ་ལོམ་བི་ཡ et:Colombia el:Κολομβία es:Colombia eo:Kolombio ext:Colómbia eu:Kolonbia ee:Colombia fa:کلمبیا hif:Colombia fo:Kolumbia fr:Colombie fy:Kolombia ga:An Cholóim gv:Yn Cholombey gag:Kolumbiya gd:Coloimbia gl:Colombia gan:哥倫比亞 gu:કોલમ્બીયા hak:Kô-lùn-pí-â xal:Коламбудин Орн ko:콜롬비아 hy:Կոլումբիա hi:कोलम्बिया hsb:Kolumbiska hr:Kolumbija io:Kolumbia ilo:Colombia bpy:কলম্বিয়া id:Kolombia ia:Colombia ie:Columbia os:Колумби xh:IsiColombia zu:IsiColombia is:Kólumbía it:Colombia he:קולומביה jv:Kolombia kl:Colombia kn:ಕೊಲೊಂಬಿಯ pam:Colombia ka:კოლუმბია ks:कोलोम्बिया kk:Колумбия Республикасы kw:Kolombi rw:Kolombiya sw:Kolombia ht:Kolonbi ku:Kolombiya mrj:Колумби lad:Kolombia la:Columbia lv:Kolumbija lb:Kolumbien lt:Kolumbija lij:Colombia li:Colombia ln:Kolombi jbo:kolombias lmo:Culumbia hu:Kolumbia mk:Колумбија mg:Kolombia ml:കൊളംബിയ arz:كولومبيا ms:Colombia mn:Колумб my:ကိုလံဘီယာနိုင်ငံ nah:Colombia na:Colombia nl:Colombia ne:कोलम्बिया new:कोलम्बिया ja:コロンビア frr:Kolumbien no:Colombia nn:Colombia nov:Kolombia oc:Colómbia mhr:Колумбий om:Colombia uz:Kolumbiya pap:Colombia km:កូឡុំប៊ី pms:Colombia nds:Kolumbien pl:Kolumbia pt:Colômbia crh:Kolombiya ro:Columbia rmy:Kolombiya rm:Columbia qu:Kulumbya ru:Колумбия sah:Колумбия se:Kolombia sa:कोलोम्बिया sco:Colombie sq:Kolumbia scn:Colombia simple:Colombia sk:Kolumbia sl:Kolumbija szl:Kolůmbijo so:Kolombiya ckb:کۆلۆمبیا sr:Колумбија sh:Kolumbija fi:Kolumbia sv:Colombia tl:Kolombiya ta:கொலொம்பியா tt:Колумбия te:కొలంబియా tet:Kolómbia th:ประเทศโคลอมเบีย tg:Кулумбия tr:Kolombiya udm:Колумбия uk:Колумбія ur:کولمبیا ug:كولومبىيە vec:Cołonbia vi:Colombia vo:Kolumbän fiu-vro:Colombia zh-classical:哥倫比亞 war:Colombia wo:Koloombi wuu:哥伦比亚 ts:Colombia yi:קאלאמביע yo:Kòlómbìà zh-yue:哥倫比亞 diq:Kolombiya zea:Colombia bat-smg:Kuolombėjė zh:哥伦比亚
This text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
, the Red Wings have won the most Stanley Cup championships (11) of any NHL franchise based in the United States, and are third overall in total NHL championships, behind the Montreal Canadiens (24) and Toronto Maple Leafs (13). They currently play home games in the 20,066 capacity Joe Louis Arena after having spent over 40 years playing in Olympia Stadium. The Red Wings are one of the most popular franchises in the NHL, so much that fans and commentators refer to Detroit and its surrounding areas as "Hockeytown".
Between the 1933–34 and 1965–66 seasons, the Red Wings missed the playoffs only four times. More recently, the Red Wings have made the playoffs in 25 of the last 27 seasons, including the last 20 in a row (1991–2011). This is the longest current streak of post-season appearances in all of North American professional sports.
Since no arena in Detroit was ready at the time, the Cougars played their first season in Windsor, Ontario at the Border Cities Arena. For the 1927–28 season, the Cougars moved into the new Detroit Olympia, which would be their home rink until December 27, 1979. This was also the first season behind the bench for Jack Adams, who would be a part of the franchise for the next 36 years as either coach or general manager.
The Cougars made the Stanley Cup playoffs for the first time in 1929 with Carson Cooper leading the team in scoring. The Cougars were outscored 7–2 in the two-game series with the Toronto Maple Leafs. In 1930, the Cougars were renamed the Falcons, but their woes continued, as they usually finished near the bottom of the standings, even though they made the playoffs again in 1932.
In 1932, the NHL let grain merchant James E. Norris buy the Falcons. Norris had made two previous unsuccessful bids to buy an NHL team. Norris' first act was to choose a new name — the Red Wings. Earlier in the century, Norris had played on one of hockey's early powers, the Montreal HC, nicknamed the "Winged Wheelers." Norris transformed the club's logo into the first version of the Red Wings logo as it is known today.
Norris also placed coach Jack Adams on a one-year probation for the 1932–33 NHL season. Jack Adams managed to pass his probationary period by leading the renamed franchise to winning its first ever playoff series by defeating the Montreal Maroons. Despite the success, the team lost in the semi-finals to the New York Rangers.
In 1934 the Wings made the Stanley Cup Finals for the first time, with John Sorrell scoring 21 goals over 47 games and Larry Aurie leading the team in scoring. However, the Chicago Black Hawks eliminated Detroit in the finals, winning the best-of-five series in four games and winning their own first title.
The Red Wings won their first Stanley Cup in 1936, defeating Toronto in four games. Detroit repeated its championship season in 1937, winning over the Rangers in the full five games.
In 1938, the Wings and the Montreal Canadiens were the first NHL teams to play in Europe, playing in Paris, France and London, England. The Wings played nine games against the Canadiens and went 3-5-1. The Wings did not play in Europe again until the preseason and start of the 2009-10 NHL season in Sweden against the St. Louis Blues.
They made the Stanley Cup Finals in three consecutive years during the early 1940s. In 1941 they were swept by the Boston Bruins, in 1942 they lost a seven-game series against Toronto in the finals after winning the first three games, but in 1943, with Syd Howe and Mud Bruneteau scoring 20 goals apiece, Detroit won their third Cup by sweeping the Bruins. Through the rest of the decade, the team made the playoffs every year, and reached the finals three more times.
In 1946, one of the greatest players in hockey history came into the NHL with the Red Wings. Gordie Howe, a right-winger from Floral, Saskatchewan, only scored seven goals and 15 assists in his first season and would not reach his prime for a few more years. It was also the last season as head coach for Adams, who stepped down after the season to concentrate on his duties as general manager. He was succeeded by minor league coach Tommy Ivan.
By his second season, Howe was paired with Sid Abel and Ted Lindsay to form what would become one of the great lines in NHL history—the "Production Line". Lindsay's 33 goals propelled the Wings to the Stanley Cup Finals, where they were swept by the Maple Leafs. Detroit reached the Finals again the following season, only to be swept again by Toronto.
After being upset by the Montreal Canadiens in the 1951 semifinals, Detroit won its fifth Cup in 1952, sweeping both the Leafs and the Canadiens, with the Production Line of Howe, Abel and Lindsay joined by second-year goalie Terry Sawchuk. Detroit would become the first team in 17 years to go undefeated in the playoffs. They also scored 24 playoff goals, compared to Toronto and Montreal's combined total of 5. Abel left the Wings for Chicago following the season, and his spot on the roster was replaced by Alex Delvecchio.
James E. Norris died in December 1952. He was succeeded as team president by his daughter, Marguerite, the first (and as of the 2006–07 season, only) woman to head an NHL franchise. She made no secret of her dislike for Adams. While she could have summarily fired him, since he was still without a contract, she chose not to do so.
Following another playoff upset in 1953 at the hands of the Bruins, the Red Wings won back to back Stanley Cups in 1954 (over Montreal, when Habs defenseman Doug Harvey redirected a Tony Leswick shot into his own net) and 1955 (also over Montreal in the full seven games). The 1954–55 season ended a run of eight straight regular season titles, an NHL record.
Also during the 1955 off-season, Marguerite Norris lost an intra-family power struggle, and was forced to turn over the Wings to her younger brother Bruce, who had inherited his father's grain business. Detroit and Montreal once again met in the 1956 finals, but this time the Canadiens won the Cup, their first of five in a row.
In 1957 Ted Lindsay, who scored 30 goals and led the league in assists with 55, teamed up with Harvey to help start the National Hockey League Players' Association (NHLPA) . As a result he, along with outspoken young goaltender Glenn Hall, was promptly traded to Chicago (which was owned by James D. Norris, Bruce's elder brother) after his most productive year.
The Lindsay deal was one of several questionable trades made by Adams in the late 1950s. For example, a year earlier, he had traded Sawchuk to Boston; while he managed to get Sawchuk back two years later, he had to trade up-and-coming Johnny Bucyk to do it. It was one of the most one-sided trades in hockey history – Bucyk went on to play 21 more years with the Bruins. The Wings lost in the first round of the playoffs to the Bruins. In 1959 the Red Wings missed the playoffs for the first time in 21 years.
Within a couple of years, Detroit was rejuvenated and made the Finals for four of the next six years between 1961 and 1966. However, despite having Howe, Delvecchio, Norm Ullman, and Parker MacDonald as consistent goal-scorers, Lindsay's sudden one-year comeback in 1964–65, and Sawchuk and later Roger Crozier between the pipes, the Wings came away empty-handed. Adams was fired as general manager in 1963. He had coached for 15 years and served as general manager for 31 years on a handshake, and his 36–year tenure as general manager is still the longest for any general manager in NHL history.
One factor in the Red Wings' decline was the end of the old "development" system, which allowed Adams to get young prospects to commit to playing for Detroit as early as their 16th birthday. Another factor was Ned Harkness, who was hired as coach in 1970 and was promoted to general manager midway through the season. A successful college hockey coach, Harkness tried to force his two-way style of play on a veteran Red Wings team resistant to change. The Wings chafed under his rule in which he demanded short hair, no smoking, and put other rules in place regarding drinking and phone calls. Harkness was forced to resign in 1973.
In the "expansion season" of 1967–68, the Red Wings also acquired longtime star left-winger Frank Mahovlich from the defending Cup champs in Toronto. Mahovlich would go on a line with Howe and Delvecchio, and in 1968–69, he scored a career-high 49 goals and had two All-Star seasons in Detroit.
But this could not last. Mahovlich was traded to Montreal in 1970, and Howe retired after the 1970–71 season. Howe returned to pro hockey shortly after to play with his two sons Mark and Marty Howe (Mark would later join the Red Wings at the end of his career) in the upstart World Hockey Association in 1972. Through the decade, with Mickey Redmond having two 50–goal seasons and Marcel Dionne starting to reach his prime (which he did not attain until he was traded to the Los Angeles Kings), a lack of defensive and goaltending ability continually hampered the Wings.
During 1979–80, the Wings left the Olympia for Joe Louis Arena. In 1982, after 50 years of family ownership, Bruce Norris sold the Red Wings to Mike Ilitch, founder of Little Caesars Pizza.
Later Park was asked to coach the Wings, but was sacked after 45 games in 1985–86. He admitted, “I took over a last-place team, and I kept them there.” They did indeed end up in the basement with a 17–57–6 record for only 40 points. This was the same year that the Wings added enforcer Bob Probert, one of the most familiar faces of the Wings in the 1980s and 1990s.
By 1987, with Yzerman, now the captain following the departure of Danny Gare, joined by Petr Klima, Adam Oates, Gerard Gallant, defenseman Darren Veitch and new head coach Jacques Demers, the Wings won a playoff series for only the second time in the modern era. They made it all the way to the conference finals against the powerful and eventual Stanley Cup champion Edmonton Oilers, but lost in five games. In 1988 they won their first division title in 23 years (since 1964–65, when they finished first in a one-division league). They did so, however, in a relatively weak division; no other team in the Norris finished above .500. As was the case in the previous season, they made it to the conference finals only to lose again to the eventual cup champion Oilers in five games.
In 1989, Yzerman scored a career-best 65 goals, but Detroit was upset in the first round by the Chicago Blackhawks. The following season Yzerman scored 62 goals, but the team missed the playoffs (As of 2011, it was the last time that the Red Wings missed the playoffs.). Rumors spread that maybe "Stevie Wonder" should be traded.
But it was Demers, not Yzerman, who got the pink slip. New coach Bryan Murray was unable to get them back over .500, but they returned to the playoffs. Yzerman was joined by Sergei Fedorov, who would be an award-winner and frequent all-star for the team in the 1990s. In 1992, the team acquired Ray Sheppard, who had a career-best 52 goals two years later; and in '93, top defenseman Paul Coffey. Also joining the Red Wings around this time were draft picks like Slava Kozlov, Darren McCarty, Vladimir Konstantinov, and Nicklas Lidstrom.
The Wings kept adding more star power, picking up Slava Fetisov, Igor Larionov, and goaltender Mike Vernon in trades and winning an NHL record 62 games in 1996. After defeating the St. Louis Blues in seven games the Wings would fall in the Western Conference Finals to the eventual champion Colorado Avalanche.
The following year, Detroit, joined by Brendan Shanahan and Larry Murphy during the season, once again reached the Finals in 1997. After defeating the St. Louis Blues, the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim and the Colorado Avalanche in the first three rounds, the Wings went on to beat the Philadelphia Flyers in four straight games in the Stanley Cup Finals. It was the Wings' first Stanley Cup since 1955, breaking the longest drought (42 years long) in the league at that time. Mike Vernon accepted the Conn Smythe Trophy as the Most Valuable Player in the 1997 playoffs.
Misfortune befell the Wings six days after their championship; defenseman Vladimir Konstantinov, one of the Wings' "Russian Five", suffered a brain injury in a limousine accident, and his career came to an abrupt end. The Red Wings dedicated the 1997–98 season, which also ended in a Stanley Cup victory, to Konstantinov, who came out onto the ice in his wheelchair on victory night to touch the Cup. The Wings won the Cup finals in another sweep, this time over the Washington Capitals. Despite his Conn Smythe Trophy in the 1997 playoffs, Mike Vernon had been replaced as the regular Wings goaltender during the season with the younger Chris Osgood. It was Osgood who minded the nets for all four games in the 1998 finals, while Steve Yzerman won the Conn Smythe.
The Wings had built up a fierce rivalry with the Avalanche. With Colorado beating Detroit in the third round in 1996, in the second round of both 1999 and 2000, and the Red Wings beating the Avs in the third round in 1997, the battles between these two teams had become one of the fiercest in sports. During a notorious game on March 26, 1997, a brawl ensued between Colorado goalie Patrick Roy and his Detroit counterpart Mike Vernon.
In 2001, Detroit, the league's second-best team in the regular season, were upset in the playoffs by the Los Angeles Kings. During the summer that followed, they acquired goalie Dominik Hasek (the defending Vezina Trophy winner) and forwards Luc Robitaille and Brett Hull. Russian prospect Pavel Datsyuk also joined the team. The Wings posted the league's best record in the 2001-02 regular season and defeated Colorado in seven games in the Western Conference Finals after beating the Vancouver Canucks and St. Louis Blues in rounds one and two. The Red Wings went on to capture another Stanley Cup in five games over the Carolina Hurricanes, with Nicklas Lidstrom winning the Conn Smythe Trophy as the playoffs' MVP. Bowman and Hasek both retired after the season.
The 2003 season saw the Red Wings promote associate coach Dave Lewis to the head coach position after Bowman's retirement. Needing a new starting goaltender after Hasek's retirement, the Red wings signed Curtis Joseph from the Toronto Maple Leafs to a three year, $24 million deal. Also new to the lineup was highly touted Swedish prospect Henrik Zetterberg. The Red Wings finished the season second in the Western Conference and third overall in the NHL. The Red Wings were favored in their first round matchup against the 7th seeded Mighty Ducks of Anaheim. But the Ducks shocked the hockey world by sweeping the Red Wings in four games.
Longtime Wing Sergei Fedorov signed with the Mighty Ducks as a free agent during the offseason after a long contract dispute. Furthermore, Dominik Hasek decided to come out of retirement and joined the Wings for the 2003–04 season. Joseph, despite being one of the highest-paid players in the NHL, spent part of the season in the minor leagues, but after Hasek was sidelined for the season with an injury, Joseph led the team to the top of the Central Division and the league standings. The Red Wings eliminated the Nashville Predators in six games in the first round of the playoffs, which led to a second round matchup with the Calgary Flames. The teams split the first four games, and headed to Detroit for a pivotal Game 5. The Red Wings lost that game 1–0, and were eliminated two nights later in Calgary by the same score in overtime.
During the 2004 offseason, the Wings focused on keeping players they already had instead of being active on the free agent market, resigning several players before the 2004–05 NHL lockout canceled the season.
Continuing the shakeup of the Red Wings roster, the offseason saw the departure of Brendan Shanahan and the return of Dominik Hasek, while Steve Yzerman announced his retirement after a 23-season Hall of Fame career with the Wings, having played the second most games in history (behind fellow Wing Alex Delvecchio) all with a single team. Yzerman further retired with the distinction of having been the longest serving team captain in NHL history.
The Red Wings opened the 2006–07 season with Nicklas Lidstrom as the new captain. The Red Wings retired Steve Yzerman's jersey number 19 on January 2. The Wings finished first in the Western Conference and tied for first in the NHL with the Buffalo Sabres, but the Sabres were awarded the Presidents' Trophy by virtue of having the greater number of wins. They advanced to the third round of the 2007 Stanley Cup playoffs after defeating the Calgary Flames and San Jose Sharks both in six games, coming back three straight after the Sharks' 2–1 series lead. The Red Wings lost to the eventual Stanley Cup winning team - the Anaheim Ducks, in the Western Conference Finals four games to two.
To start the 2007–08 campaign, Henrik Zetterberg recorded at least a point in each of Detroit's first 16 games, setting a club record. The Wings cruised to the playoffs, where they faced the Nashville Predators. After goalie Dominik Hasek played poorly in Games 3 and 4 of the series, both losses, head coach Mike Babcock replaced him with Chris Osgood. Osgood had departed the Wings earlier in the decade, only to be re-acquired as a backup in 2005. Osgood never left the net for the remainder of the playoffs, as the Red Wings came back in that series on their way to winning their 11th Stanley Cup. The final victory came on June 4, 2008, against the Pittsburgh Penguins, by a score of 3-2. This was the Wings' fourth Stanley Cup in 11 years. Zetterberg scored the winning goal in the decisive Game 6, and was also named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as the Most Valuable Player of the playoffs. It was the first time a team captained by a non-North American player (Nicklas Lidstrom) won the Stanley Cup.
On July 2, 2008, the Detroit Red Wings announced the signing of Marian Hossa. From the beginning of the 2008–09 season to New Year's Day, the Wings enjoyed success. Although they finished second in the conference to the San Jose Sharks, the Wings became the first team in NHL history to top 100 points in nine straight seasons. On January 1, 2009, the Red Wings played the Chicago Blackhawks in the third NHL Winter Classic at Chicago's Wrigley Field, beating them 6-4. The Wings entered the 2009 Stanley Cup Playoffs as the second overall seed in the Western Conference. The Red Wings handily swept the Columbus Blue Jackets, then beat the 8th-seeded Anaheim Ducks in a hard fought seven-game series. They took on the vastly improved Chicago Blackhawks in the Conference Finals, winning in five games. The Red Wings would face the Pittsburgh Penguins in the Finals for a second consecutive year, but this series would feature a different outcome. Pittsburgh defeated the Red Wings in seven games, Detroit becoming only the second NHL team to lose the Cup at home in Game 7.
The Red Wings began the 2009-10 NHL Season in Stockholm, Sweden, falling in both games to the St. Louis Blues by scores of 4-3 and 5-3, respectively. They were plagued by injuries throughout the season and lost the second most man-games to injury, with only the last place Edmonton Oilers losing more. The beginning of the season was a struggle for the Wings, with key players out of the lineup including Henrik Zetterberg, Tomas Holmstrom, Johan Franzen, Valtteri Filppula, and Niklas Kronwall. After the Olympic break, Detroit posted a record of 13-2-2 and earned 28 points, the most by any team in the NHL in the month of March. This run helped them secure the fifth playoff seed in the Western Conference. Detroit won their first-round playoff series over the Phoenix Coyotes in seven games. In the second round, they fell behind the San Jose Sharks three games to one, before being knocked out of the playoffs in five games. All four games that the Red Wings lost that series were decided by one goal. The lone game that they won ended with a final score of 7-1.
A healthier Red Wings team finished the 2010–11 NHL season with a 47-25-10 record and 104 points to win the Central Division title. They earned the #3 seed in the Western Conference for the Stanley Cup playoffs (extending their professional sports record of post-season appearances to 20 seasons), finishing behind the Vancouver Canucks (117) and San Jose Sharks (105). The Wings again faced the Phoenix Coyotes in the first round of the playoffs, this time sweeping them 4–0—making them the only team in the 2010-2011 Stanley Cup Playoffs to sweep the first round—and again moved on to play the Sharks in Round 2. After losing the first three games of the series against the Sharks, the Red Wings won three consecutive games to force a Game 7, becoming just the eighth team in NHL history to accomplish the feat (the Chicago Blackhawks became the seventh team to do so earlier in the 2011 Stanley Cup Playoffs, against the Vancouver Canucks). The Red Wings lost Game 7 to the Sharks by a score of 3-2, and were eliminated.
The Red Wings have not used any alternate logos or uniforms since the trend became popular in the 1990s, the sole exceptions were select games of the 1991–92 season commemorating the league's 75th Anniversary, and for a commemorative game in 1994 at Chicago Stadium. Those jerseys were based on the uniforms worn by the team (then the Detroit Cougars) in 1927–28. The throwbacks are primarily white with five red horizontal stripes on the body, the broadest middle stripe bearing "DETROIT" in bold letters, and three red stripes on the sleeves.
The striped throwbacks have been a popular design, as replicas continue to be marketed by the NHL. This jersey was also a basis for the uniforms worn by Wayne Gretzky's team of NHLPA All-Stars, nicknamed the "99ers", for their exhibition tour in Europe during the 1994–95 NHL lockout; a picture of Gretzky in this jersey was used for the cover art of a video game bearing his name.
Alternate jerseys for the RBK Edge system were made for 2008–2009 and continues today, but Detroit has thus far opted not to use alternates.
The Red Wings wore alternative "Retro" jerseys for the 2009 NHL Winter Classic in Chicago. The one-time jerseys were based on the uniforms worn by the then-Detroit Cougars during their inaugural season of 1926–27. These jerseys were white, with a single bold red stripe on the sleeves and chest, and a uniquely-styled white Old English "D" (a Detroit sports tradition, but formerly used by the Wings, Detroit Lions, and the University of Detroit Titans) centered on the chest stripe, but not to be confused with the Old English "D" used by the Detroit Tigers. These jerseys were also worn for their final 2009 regular season home game, again against the Chicago Blackhawks.
The "Legend of the Octopus" is a sports tradition during Detroit Red Wings playoff games, in which an octopus is thrown onto the ice surface for good luck.
During the playoffs, Joe Louis Arena is generally adorned with a giant octopus with red eyes, nicknamed "Al" after Joe Louis Arena head ice manager Al Sobotka.
The 1952 playoffs featured the start of the tradition—the octopus throw. The owner of a local fish market, Peter Cusimano, threw one from the stands onto the ice. The eight legs were purportedly symbolic of the eight wins it took to win the Stanley Cup at the time. The Red Wings went on to sweep both of their opponents that year en route to a Stanley Cup championship. The NHL has, at various times, tried to eliminate this tradition but it continues to this day.
Al Sobotka is the man responsible for removing the thrown creatures from the ice. He is known for swinging the tossed octopi above his head when walking off the ice. On April 19, 2008, NHL director of hockey operations Colin Campbell sent a memo to the Detroit Red Wings organization that forbids Zamboni drivers from cleaning up any octopuses thrown onto the ice and that violating the mandate would result in a $10,000 fine. Instead, it will be the linesmen who will perform this duty. In an email to the Detroit Free Press, NHL spokesman Frank Brown justified the ban because "matter flies off the octopus and gets on the ice" when Al Sobotka does it. This ban, however, was later loosened to allow for the octopus twirling to take place at the zamboni entrance.
During the late stages of games, especially around the end of the season and during the playoffs, the fans at Joe Louis Arena are known to start singing along to Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'". The lines, "born and raised in south Detroit" are the highlight of the song, even though the city is delineated as East and West Detroit and such a location does not exist.
The Red Wings' exclusive local television rights are held by Fox Sports Detroit.
Announcers:
During many home games on FS Detroit where Ken Daniels and Mickey Redmond are in the booth, Larry Murphy also provides analysis "between the benches" during games. During road games which Mickey Redmond cannot attend, Murphy provides commentary alongside Daniels in the booth.
Lynch called the first locally televised game at Olympia for the original WWJ-TV in 1949. He has remained with the organization for over 60 years, serving as Director of Publicity from 1975–1982, and public address announcer since 1982. Since 2008, John Fossen has joined Lynch in performing PA duties.
Note: GP = Games played; W = Wins; L = Losses; T = Ties; OTL = Overtime losses; Pts = Points; GF = Goals for; GA = Goals against
Records as of April 10, 2011.
Season | GP| | W | L | OTL | Pts | GF | GA | Finish | Playoffs | |
2006–07 Detroit Red Wings season | 2006–07 | 82| | 50 | 19 | 13 | 113 | 254 | 199 | 1st, Central | Anaheim Ducks>Ducks) |
2007–08 NHL season | 2007–08 | 82| | 54 | 21 | 7 | 115 | 257 | 184 | 1st, Central | 2008 Stanley Cup Finals |
[[2008-09 NHL season | 2008–09 | 82| | 51 | 21 | 10 | 112 | 295 | 244 | 1st, Central | Finals, 3–4 (Pittsburgh Penguins>Penguins) |
2009–10 NHL season | 2009–10 | 82| | 44 | 24 | 14 | 102 | 229 | 216 | 2nd, Central | San Jose Sharks>Sharks) |
2010-11 NHL season | 2010-11 | 82| | 47 | 25 | 10 | 104 | 261 | 241 | 1st, Central | San Jose Sharks>Sharks) |
Builders
Not available for issue: 6 Larry Aurie, RW, 1927–1939, following his retirement from the NHL. This was the first number ever retired by the Detroit Red Wings; however, Aurie does not have a banner hanging in Joe Louis Arena. The NHL's official information publication, the Official NHL Guide And Record Book, listed the number as being retired from 1975 until 2000 when reference to it was removed at the request of the Red Wings organization. The team no longer considers the number to be retired, although it is not available for use.
Note: Pos = Position; GP = Games Played; G = Goals; A = Assists; Pts = Points; P/G = Points per game; * = current Red Wings player
{| |- | style="font-weight:bold; background-color:#dddddd;" align="center" | Points|| style="font-weight:bold; background-color:#dddddd;text-align=center;" align="center" |Goals|| style="font-weight:bold; background-color:#dddddd;text-align=center;" align="center" |Assists |- |
align="left" | Player | Pos| | GP | G | A | Pts | P/G |
align="left" | Gordie Howe | RW| | 1687 | 786 | 1023 | 1809 | 1.07 |
align="left" | Steve Yzerman | C| | 1514 | 692 | 1063 | 1755 | 1.16 |
align="left" | Alex Delvecchio | C| | 1549 | 456 | 825 | 1281 | 0.83 |
align="left" | Nicklas Lidstrom* | D| | 1494 | 253 | 855 | 1108 | 0.74 |
align="left" | Sergei Fedorov | C| | 908 | 400 | 554 | 954 | 1.05 |
align="left" | Norm Ullman | C| | 875 | 324 | 434 | 758 | 0.87 |
align="left" | Ted Lindsay | LW| | 862 | 335 | 393 | 728 | 0.84 |
align="left" | Pavel Datsyuk* | C| | 662 | 221 | 430 | 651 | 0.98 |
align="left" | Brendan Shanahan | LW| | 716 | 309 | 324 | 633 | 0.88 |
align="left" | Reed Larson | D| | 708 | 188 | 382 | 570 | 0.80 |
align="left" | Player | Pos |
align="left" | Gordie Howe | RW |
align="left" | Steve Yzerman | C |
align="left" | Alex Delvecchio | C |
align="left" | Sergei Fedorov | C |
align="left" | Ted Lindsay | LW |
align="left" | Norm Ullman | C |
align="left" | Brendan Shanahan | LW |
align="left" | John Ogrodnick | RW |
align="left" | Nicklas Lidstrom* | D |
align="left" | Tomas Holmstrom* | RW |
align="left" | Player | Pos |
align="left" | Steve Yzerman | C |
align="left" | Gordie Howe | RW |
align="left" | Nicklas Lidstrom* | D |
align="left" | Alex Delvecchio | C |
align="left" | Sergei Fedorov | C |
align="left" | Norm Ullman | C |
align="left" | Pavel Datsyuk* | C |
align="left" | Ted Lindsay | LW |
align="left" | Reed Larson | D |
align="left" | Henrik Zetterberg* | C |
Bill Masterton Memorial Trophy
Category:Culture of Detroit, Michigan R Category:Sports clubs established in 1926 Category:Professional ice hockey teams in Michigan Category:Central Division (NHL)
be:Дэтройт Рэд Уінгз be-x-old:Дэтройт Рэд Ўінгз bg:Детройт Ред Уингс ca:Detroit Red Wings cs:Detroit Red Wings da:Detroit Red Wings de:Detroit Red Wings es:Detroit Red Wings fr:Red Wings de Détroit gl:Detroit Red Wings hr:Detroit Red Wings id:Detroit Red Wings it:Detroit Red Wings he:דטרויט רד וינגס lv:Detroitas "Red Wings" lt:Detroit Red Wings hu:Detroit Red Wings nl:Detroit Red Wings ja:デトロイト・レッドウィングス no:Detroit Red Wings pl:Detroit Red Wings pt:Detroit Red Wings ru:Детройт Ред Уингз simple:Detroit Red Wings sk:Detroit Red Wings sl:Detroit Red Wings sr:Детроит ред вингси sh:Detroit Red Wings fi:Detroit Red Wings sv:Detroit Red Wings tr:Detroit Red Wings uk:Детройт Ред-Вінгс zh:底特律紅翼This text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
name | Nando de Colo |
---|---|
nickname | Aladdin |
position | Point Guard , Shooting Guard |
league | Spanish ACB League |
height ft | 6 |
height in | 5 |
weight lbs | 200 |
birth date | June 23, 1987 |
birth place | Sainte-Catherine-lès-Arras, France |
nationality | French |
team | Valencia |
draft | 2nd round, 53rd overall |
draft year | 2009 |
draft team | San Antonio Spurs |
career start | 2006 |
former teams | Cholet Basket (2006-09) |
awards | French All-Star Game MVP 2007French League MVP 2008}} |
Nando de Colo (alternate spelling: Nando De Colo) (born June 23, 1987 in Sainte-Catherine-lès-Arras, France) is a French professional basketball player. His parents are from Portugal.
Category:French basketball players Category:Valencia BC players Category:French people of Portuguese descent Category:San Antonio Spurs draft picks Category:Guards (basketball) Category:Point guards Category:Shooting guards Category:1987 births Category:Living people
ca:Nando de Colo es:Nando de Colo fr:Nando de Colo gl:Nando de Colo it:Nando de Colo ja:ナンド・デ・コロ pl:Nando De Colo sr:Нандо де Коло
This text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
The World News (WN) Network, has created this privacy statement in order to demonstrate our firm commitment to user privacy. The following discloses our information gathering and dissemination practices for wn.com, as well as e-mail newsletters.
We do not collect personally identifiable information about you, except when you provide it to us. For example, if you submit an inquiry to us or sign up for our newsletter, you may be asked to provide certain information such as your contact details (name, e-mail address, mailing address, etc.).
When you submit your personally identifiable information through wn.com, you are giving your consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information as set forth in this Privacy Policy. If you would prefer that we not collect any personally identifiable information from you, please do not provide us with any such information. We will not sell or rent your personally identifiable information to third parties without your consent, except as otherwise disclosed in this Privacy Policy.
Except as otherwise disclosed in this Privacy Policy, we will use the information you provide us only for the purpose of responding to your inquiry or in connection with the service for which you provided such information. We may forward your contact information and inquiry to our affiliates and other divisions of our company that we feel can best address your inquiry or provide you with the requested service. We may also use the information you provide in aggregate form for internal business purposes, such as generating statistics and developing marketing plans. We may share or transfer such non-personally identifiable information with or to our affiliates, licensees, agents and partners.
We may retain other companies and individuals to perform functions on our behalf. Such third parties may be provided with access to personally identifiable information needed to perform their functions, but may not use such information for any other purpose.
In addition, we may disclose any information, including personally identifiable information, we deem necessary, in our sole discretion, to comply with any applicable law, regulation, legal proceeding or governmental request.
We do not want you to receive unwanted e-mail from us. We try to make it easy to opt-out of any service you have asked to receive. If you sign-up to our e-mail newsletters we do not sell, exchange or give your e-mail address to a third party.
E-mail addresses are collected via the wn.com web site. Users have to physically opt-in to receive the wn.com newsletter and a verification e-mail is sent. wn.com is clearly and conspicuously named at the point of
collection.If you no longer wish to receive our newsletter and promotional communications, you may opt-out of receiving them by following the instructions included in each newsletter or communication or by e-mailing us at michaelw(at)wn.com
The security of your personal information is important to us. We follow generally accepted industry standards to protect the personal information submitted to us, both during registration and once we receive it. No method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100 percent secure, however. Therefore, though we strive to use commercially acceptable means to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.
If we decide to change our e-mail practices, we will post those changes to this privacy statement, the homepage, and other places we think appropriate so that you are aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances, if any, we disclose it.
If we make material changes to our e-mail practices, we will notify you here, by e-mail, and by means of a notice on our home page.
The advertising banners and other forms of advertising appearing on this Web site are sometimes delivered to you, on our behalf, by a third party. In the course of serving advertisements to this site, the third party may place or recognize a unique cookie on your browser. For more information on cookies, you can visit www.cookiecentral.com.
As we continue to develop our business, we might sell certain aspects of our entities or assets. In such transactions, user information, including personally identifiable information, generally is one of the transferred business assets, and by submitting your personal information on Wn.com you agree that your data may be transferred to such parties in these circumstances.