Solomon Islands

Solomon Islands is an archipelagic country of six major islands and more than 1,000 smaller islands in Melanesia, Oceania, northeast of Australia and near Bougainville, New Caledonia, Vanuatu and Fiji, covering 28,896 square kilometers. Honiara, on Guadalcanal, is the capital and largest city of a country whose 2025 population was estimated at 828,857. Human settlement dates back approximately 30,000 to 28,800 BC; Spanish navigator Alvaro de Mendana became the first European visitor in 1568, Britain established a protectorate in 1893, and the islands achieved self-government in 1976 and full independence on 7 July 1978. Solomon Islands is a unitary parliamentary constitutional monarchy with King Charles III as monarch, represented by a governor-general, and Prime Minister Matthew Wale heading the government; English is the official language, though Pijin serves as the lingua franca, and the population is predominantly Melanesian, at 95.3 percent, and Christian, at 97.4 percent.