Which one of the following is NOT a Mediterranean country ?

Correct — C, North Sudan. Five African countries have a Mediterranean coastline, and running west to east they are Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Egypt. Sudan is not among them. Its coast faces the Red Sea, with Port Sudan as its principal harbour, and the country is separated from the Mediterranean by the whole width of Egypt. The paper's phrasing is worth a note — after South Sudan became independent in 2011 the northern remainder is officially just the Republic of the Sudan, and North Sudan is an informal way of naming it.

• (a)Tunisia — Mediterranean on two sides. Cape Angela in Tunisia is the northernmost point of the African continent, and Tunis stands on a gulf of the Mediterranean.
• (b)Libya — Has the longest Mediterranean coastline of any African country, with Tripoli and Benghazi on it and the Gulf of Sidra cutting into it.
• (d)Egypt — Mediterranean at Alexandria and Port Said, and the northern mouth of the Suez Canal opens into it. Egypt is the country that lies between Sudan and the sea.

The Mediterranean is an almost enclosed sea joined to the Atlantic by the narrow Strait of Gibraltar and to the Red Sea by the artificial cut of the Suez Canal. Something over twenty countries touch it across three continents — the European shore from Spain to Greece and Turkey, the Asian shore of Syria, Lebanon and Israel, and the African shore of the five countries named above, with the island states of Malta and Cyprus in the middle.

Two habits make items like this reliable. The first is to fix the African shore as a run of five countries from Morocco to Egypt, so that any sixth African name in an option list is immediately suspect. The second is to remember which countries in the region face a different sea altogether — Sudan and Eritrea face the Red Sea, Jordan opens only onto the Gulf of Aqaba, and Iraq's short coastline is on the Persian Gulf. Sudan's Red Sea position is worth knowing for its own sake, since Port Sudan is the country's outlet and the Red Sea shipping route through the Bab-el-Mandeb strait to the Suez Canal is one of the busiest and most contested in the world.

• The African Mediterranean coast belongs to Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Egypt, in that order from west to east.
• Sudan's coast is on the Red Sea, and Port Sudan is its principal seaport.
• Libya has the longest Mediterranean coastline in Africa; Cape Angela in Tunisia is the continent's northernmost point.
• The Mediterranean joins the Atlantic through the Strait of Gibraltar and the Red Sea through the Suez Canal.
• Malta and Cyprus are the island states of the Mediterranean; Jordan and Iraq, often confused into the group, face the Gulf of Aqaba and the Persian Gulf.

• Grouping all of North Africa and West Asia into one Mediterranean set.
• Forgetting that Egypt lies between Sudan and the Mediterranean.
• Reading a country's importance to Mediterranean trade as proof that it has a Mediterranean coast.

Coastline items are best answered by reciting a memorised sequence along the shore rather than by judging each country separately.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Which one of the following countries does NOT have a coastline on the Red Sea?

  • (a)Sudan
  • (b)Eritrea
  • (c)Jordan
  • (d)Algeria

  Answer(d) Algeria — its coast is on the Mediterranean, while Jordan reaches the Red Sea through the Gulf of Aqaba.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Strait of Gibraltar connects the Mediterranean Sea with

  • (a)the Black Sea
  • (b)the Atlantic Ocean
  • (c)the Red Sea
  • (d)the Caspian Sea

  Answer(b) the Atlantic Ocean — the Suez Canal is the link to the Red Sea and the Bosporus the link to the Black Sea.