Canada is a country occupying most of northern North America. It is the world's second-largest country by total area, and extends from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean. Canada shares land borders with the United States to the northwest and south.[1]

Inhabited first by aboriginal peoples, Canada was founded in 1867 as a union of British colonies (some of which were formerly French colonies). It gained independence from the United Kingdom in an incremental process that ended in 1982. It remains a Commonwealth Realm with Queen Elizabeth II as its head of state.