ET — Ethiopia

Ethiopia is the second-most populous country in Africa with over 120 million people and one of the oldest nations in the world, with a history stretching back thousands of years. It is the only African country never colonized by a European power. Addis Ababa, the capital, serves as the headquarters of the African Union. Ethiopia uses a unique calendar (the Ethiopian calendar) that is approximately seven years behind the Gregorian calendar and has 13 months, creating significant challenges for date handling in software. For developers, the ET country code maps to the am-ET locale for Amharic, written in the Ge'ez (Ethiopic) script — a complex syllabary with over 300 characters. The Ethiopian Birr (ETB) follows standard decimal formatting. The .et domain and +251 calling code serve Ethiopia's large and growing internet population. Ethiopia's unique calendar system, Ge'ez script, and massive market make it one of the most important African locales for thorough internationalization testing.