Western Asia. Final review

Western Asia includes the Asia Minor peninsula and the Armenian and Iranian highlands; it borders Eastern Europe in the north, Central Asia in the east, South Asia in the south-east and South-West Asia in the south. Its basement formed in the Palaeozoic and was raised and rejuvenated again by the Alpine folding, so it lies in an active seismic belt with frequent earthquakes. The relief is mainly low, flat-topped uplands, with lowlands on the western and southern edges. The Pontic, Taurus and Zagros ranges rise to about 3 700–4 400 m, and the Caucasus to over 5 000 m; on the Iranian Plateau Damavand (about 5 610 m) is the region’s highest dormant volcano, and in Turkey Mount Ararat is 5 137 m. The book gives the highest point as Elbrus (5 642 m) in the Caucasus, which is normally counted as part of the Caucasus mountain system. The climate is Mediterranean in the west and subtropical continental in the south-east. In the north winter drops to –15 °C and summer is +20…+24 °C; in the south winter is +2…+10 °C, summer +32 °C and sometimes +45…+50 °C. Rainfall is very low on the inner plateaus (50–300 mm, under 100 mm in the Iranian deserts) and reaches 1 000 mm or more on mountain slopes facing the seas. Rivers: Kura, Aras, Karun, Harirud and Atrek; lakes: Van and Urmia (Urmia is now a salt lake almost drying up). Soils are light chestnut, brown, mountain-forest and sandy desert soils. Plants: oak, beech, wild vine, pistachio, date palm; animals: bighorn sheep, leopard, goitered gazelle, jackal, sand cat, ruddy shelduck.