Ryukyu Islands

The Ryukyu Islands, also known as the Nansei Islands or the Ryukyu Arc, are a chain of Japanese islands that stretch southwest from Kyushu to Taiwan. Administratively they are divided between Kagoshima Prefecture, which holds the Satsunan Islands, and Okinawa Prefecture, which holds the Okinawa, Miyako, Yaeyama, Daito and Senkaku Islands. The larger islands are mostly volcanic and the smaller ones mostly coral, and the largest is Okinawa Island. The climate runs from humid subtropical in the north to tropical rainforest in the south, with very high precipitation shaped by the rainy season and typhoons. The Amami, Okinawa, Miyako and Yaeyama Islands are home to the Ryukyuan people, named for the former Ryukyu Kingdom that ruled them from 1429 to 1875. The islands were held by the United States after the Pacific War and returned to Japan under the 1971 Okinawa reversion agreement.