China's Administrative Territory Division System

The Constitution of the PRC stipulates administrative areas of China are divided as follows:

(1) The whole country is divided into provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities under direct control from the Central Government.

(2) The provinces are sub-divided into autonomous prefectures, counties, autonomous counties, and cities.

(3) Counties, autonomous counties and cities are divided into townships and nationality townships. The autonomous regions, autonomous prefectures, and autonomous counties are all national autonomous areas. The central government in Beijing sets up the special administrative regions as needs warrant. At present, there are 34 provincial administrative units in China including 4 municipalities directly under the Central Government. There are 23 provinces, 5 autonomous regions, and 2 special administrative regions.

Chinese Territory

China, (People's Republic of China), is situated in eastern Asia. It is bounded by the Pacific Ocean in the east and has an area of 9.6 million square kilometers. It is the third largest country in the world, next to Canada and Russia.

China's borders begin about midstream along the Heilong River north of Mohe (53 degrees and 31 minutes north latitude) to the southernmost island Zengmu'ansha in the South China Sea (4 degrees ), about 5,500 kilometers (more than 49 degrees latitude) apart ,from the confluence of the Heilong and Wusuli rivers (135 degrees and 5 minutes east longitude) in the east; to the Pamirs (73 degrees and 40 minutes east longitude) in the west, about 5,000 kilometers (more than 60 degrees longitude) apart.

The border stretches over 22,800 kilometers. It reaches west to South Korea and south to Mongolia, southwest to Russia and southeast to Kazakhstan, Krygyzstan, Tajikistan. China also borders Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Nepal and Bhutan in west and northwest and Burma, Laos, Vietnam in the south.