Italy (Italian: Italia, officially the Italian Republic; Italian: Repubblica Italiana), is a country located in Southern Europe, that comprises the Po River valley, the Italian Peninsula and the two largest islands in the Mediterranean Sea, Sicily and Sardinia. Italians also refer to it as "lo stivale" ("the boot," due to its boot-like shape), "il Bel Paese" (the beautiful country) or "la Penisola" (the peninsula).
Italy shares its northern alpine boundary with France, Switzerland, Austria and Slovenia. The independent states of San Marino and the Vatican City are enclaves within Italian territory, while Campione d'Italia is an Italian exclave in Switzerland.
Italy was home to many well-known and influential European cultures, including the Etruscans, Greeks, and the Romans. Its capital Rome has laid the foundations for Western society, and is an historically important world city, especially as the core of ancient Rome and the Roman Catholic Church.
For more than 3,000 years, Italy experienced migrations and invasions from Germanic, Celtic, Frankish, Lombard, Byzantine Greek, Saracen and Norman peoples during the Middle Ages, followed by the Italian Renaissance period, in which the Italian Wars took place and various city-states were noted for their cultural achievements.
Italy was divided into many independent states and often experienced foreign domination before the Italian unification, that created Italy as an independent nation-state for the first time in its history, took place. During the period under the Italian monarchy and during the world wars Italy experienced much conflict, but stability was restored after the creation of the Italian Republic.
Today, Italy is a developed country with the seventh-highest GDP and the 17th-highest Human Development Index rating in the world. It is a member of the G8 and a founding member of what is now the European Union (having signed the Treaty of Rome in 1957), of the Council of Europe and of the Western European Union and of the Central European Initiative. Italy is a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council. It is considered by some a great power. Inhabitants of Italy are referred to as Italians (Italiani, or poetically Italici).
Malta, officially the Republic of Malta, is a small and densely populated island nation comprising an archipelago of seven islands in the Mediterranean Sea. A country of Southern Europe, Malta lies south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya.
The country's official languages are Maltese and English. Roman Catholicism is the most practiced religion. The islands constituting the Maltese nation have been ruled by various powers and fought over for centuries.
Malta has been a member state of the European Union (EU) since 2004 and it is currently the smallest EU country both in population and in area.
Information compiled from Wikipedia and The World Factbook