Hong Kong is a special administrative region of China. With 7.4 million residents in a 1,104-square-kilometre territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the world. Hong Kong was established as a colony of the British Empire after the Qing dynasty ceded Hong Kong Island in 1841–1842 as a consequence of losing the First Opium War. The colony expanded to the Kowloon Peninsula in 1860 and was further extended when the United Kingdom obtained a 99-year lease of the New Territories in 1898. Hong Kong was occupied by Japan from 1941 to 1945 during World War II. The territory was handed over from the United Kingdom to China in 1997. Hong Kong maintains separate governing and economic systems from that of mainland China under the principle of one country, two systems.
Sovereign state: China
British possession: 26 January 1841
Treaty of Nanking: 29 August 1842
Convention of Peking: 24 October 1860
New Territories lease: 9 June 1898
Imperial Japanese occupation: 25 December 1941 to 30 August 1945
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