United States Foreign Relations Marshall Islands

Orange County will probably get its first consulate in about a year, and the event may do more for geographical literacy than a dozen PBS travelogues. Got your atlas ready? Look up the Marshall Islands (hint: between Hawaii and Guam). It's a collection of 29 atolls and 1,225 tiny islands with a land mass of about 70 square miles in the central Pacific, home to approximately 43,300 Marshallese.

Orange County will probably get its first consulate in about a year, and the event may do more for geographical literacy than a dozen PBS travelogues. Got your atlas ready? Look up the Marshall Islands (hint: between Hawaii and Guam). It's a collection of 29 atolls and 1,225 tiny islands with a land mass of about 70 square miles in the central Pacific, home to approximately 43,300 Marshallese.

When government officials decided last summer to open the first garbage dump in this tiny mid-Pacific nation, residents argued bitterly over where to put the two-acre eyesore. The only surprise was why. "Everybody wanted it on their land," recalled Ronald Cannarella, a local environmental official. "It was an incredible fight." The reason is that trash means landfill.

When government officials decided last summer to open the first garbage dump in this tiny mid-Pacific nation, residents argued bitterly over where to put the two-acre eyesore. The only surprise was why. "Everybody wanted it on their land," recalled Ronald Cannarella, a local environmental official. "It was an incredible fight." The reason is that trash means landfill.