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Brunei
with a size of 5769 square kilometres is located on
the northwest end of Borneo Island. Brunei Darussalam
has a common border with the Malaysian state of Sarawak,
which divides the country into two parts consisting
of four districts. The eastern part is Temburong district
and the western part consists of Brunei-Muara, Tutong
and Belait districts. Bandar Seri Begawan (BSB), the
capital and centre of government and business activities
is situated in the Brunei-Muara district. Direct flights
from BSB to Asean capitals like Bangkok, Jakarta, Kuala
Lumpur, Manila and Singapore take between one and a
half to three hours. Daily flights are also available
from BSB to Kota Kinabalu in Sabah and to Kuching in
Sarawak.
Brunei
can trace its beginnings to the 7th century, when it
was a subject state of the Srivijayan empire under the
name Po-ni. It later became a vassal state of Majapahit[citation
needed] before embracing Islam in the 15th century.
At the peak of its empire, the sultanate had control
that extended over the coastal regions of modern-day
Sarawak and Sabah, the Sulu archipelago, and the islands
off the northwest tip of Borneo. The thalassocracy was
visited by Ferdinand Magellan in 1521 and fought the
Castille War in 1578 against Spain. Its empire began
to decline with the forced ceding of Sarawak to James
Brooke and the ceding of Sabah to the British North
Borneo Chartered Company. After the loss of Limbang,
Brunei finally became a British protectorate in 1888,
receiving a resident in 1906. In the post-occupation
years, it formalised a constitution and fought an armed
rebellion.
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