Equatorial Guinea is located in Western Africa along the Atlantic Ocean between Cameroon and Gabon. It gained independence from Spain in 1968, and is the only Spanish-speaking country in Africa. With a population of just around 650,000, it is also one of the smallest countries on the African continent. The authoritarian government following independence resulted in human-rights violations, the flight of many residents, and general deterioration of the economy. In 1979, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo led a successful coup and executed the former president. Obiang assumed the presidency and has ruled the country since then. Despite the formal ending of one-party rule in 1991, President Obiang and a circle of advisors (drawn largely from his own family and ethnic group) maintain real authority. Equatorial Guinea’s economy was historically based on agriculture, with cocoa, coffee and timber as its primary products. Since significant offshore oil discoveries and the beginning of oil production in 1995, massive foreign investment in the energy sector and rising oil exports have contributed to the country’s impressive economic growth. Today, it is one of the fastest-growing economies in Africa, and the third largest producer of oil in Sub-Saharan Africa, after Nigeria and Angola.