If you've ever worked as a general assignment reporter, you've probably had an experience like this one:

A foreign dignitary is coming to town to give a speech on his home country, and the city desk dumps it on you without warning. You need some quick background or even a basic fact, such as the population or comparative size of the country.

You can try to dig out that dog-eared copy of the almanac stashed somewhere in the library.

Or you can dial up the CIA to get the information over the Internet.

Every year, the country?s top spy agency publishes its 'World Fact Book' with detailed background on countries of the world. The publication is available online at 'http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html.

It?s one of a number of Web sites that have compiled information on foreign nations, ranging from human rights reports and literacy rates to economic indicators and demographic statistics. There even are lists of the phone numbers and Web pages of foreign embassies in the United States.

For a reporter, the resources can be invaluable in preparing for a story. Or they can provide the information the graphics department needs for a quick infobox to accompany an article.

To use the CIA World Fact Book, go to their home page and click on the highlighted word ?countries? to get to the listings for individual nations.

You'll see the countries listed alphabetically in the frame on the left. Scroll down and click on the name of any country and a map will appear on the right. Scroll below the map and you'll find information on:   Geography, including the comparative size of the country (thus Indonesia is described as slightly less than three times the size of Texas) and the total land area in square kilometers. Prefer square miles? Try this page -- 'http://www.concretepages.com/calcconv.htm -- to instantly do the conversion.   People, including the total population, the growth, birth and death rates, life expectancy, infant mortality, and breakdowns by ethnic and religious group.   Government, including the national capital, a list of provinces or states, the date of independence, a list of political parties and the address and phone number for the country?s U.S. consulate or embassy.   Economy, including the gross domestic product and growth rate, inflation rate, national budget and debt, and exports and imports (although some of the numbers may be several years old).   Communications, including how many telephones, radios, television sets and broadcast outlets there are in the country.   Transportation, including the number of airports, the names of the major seaports and the size of the highway and railway systems in kilometers (again use the conversion calculators at http://www.concretepages.com/calcconv.htm to change those numbers to miles).   Military, including the various service branches, the number of people fit for service and the annual military budget.   Transnational issues, including a description of border disputes and drug trafficking activities.   The CIA also puts out a convenient little publication, The Handbook of International Economic Statistics, that has charts and graphs on the economic and industrial output, foreign trade, and energy, agriculture and mining industries of countries and regions of the world. The handbook is at 'http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/hies97/toc.htm.

For the most current demographic information on a country, try the U.S. Census Bureau's International Data Base at http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idbprint.html.

At that page, you use a drop-down menu to select the type of data you want, such as total population, breakdowns by ethnicity, religion or language, infant mortality and birth and death rates, literacy, marital status, numbers of migrants, contraceptive use, and so on.

Then pick a country and the year or range of dates you want from 1950 to 1998. Scroll down and click on ?Submit Query? to call up the data.

You also can get projections through the year 2050 for much of the data by using the 'Year Selection' menu to pick a specific year or by typing in a range of dates.

For a quick summary of the most commonly used demographic data for an individual country, along with some historical comparisons and projections to the year 2010, go to the IDB Summary Demographic Data page at http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idbsum.html.

Need still more detailed information on a country? There are several other sites on the Internet that compile additional data:   The United Nations has an easy-to-use ?Infonation? Web page at http://www.un.org/Pubs/CyberSchoolBus/infonation/e_infonation.htm.   There you select a country in the frame on the right, click on 'Data Menu,' and at the next page pick the kind of data you want. Besides basic demographic information, you?ll also find everything from the number of homicides and motor vehicles to the average temperature and an endangered species list for each nation.   The Library of Congress has its ?Country Studies? Web site at http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/cshome.html that features detailed background reports on 85 foreign countries. The studies, which have a lot of historical information, can be searched by keyword to locate the portion of the report that deals with the topic you?re interested in.  The Country Briefing on Australia (http://www.economist.com/countries/Australia/) has collected on one page links to human rights studies by Amnesty International, the U.S. State Department and the United Nations, general background reports on nations of the world done by the U.S. State Department and the Library of Congress, and economic studies done by the World Bank and State Department. Just scroll down the main page to the general topic categories and click on one of the links to get the information on a particular country.   Nanyang Technological University in Singapore has a ?Statistical Data Locators? Web page with links to the government and private agencies in each country that produce statistical information on trade, banking and finance, real estate, tourism and so on.

The Statistical Data Locators Web page is at http://www.ntu.edu.sg/library/statdata.htm. Once there, click on an area of the world to see what online databases are available for each country.   If you want comparisons between countries, the United Nations has a ?social indicators? section of its Web site that features charts on population, education, health, literacy, housing, income, and unemployment statistics. That page is at http://www.un.org/Depts/unsd/social/main.htm.

Another source of data on individual countries is the annual 'Statistical Yearbook' of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.

UNESCO has an online version of the yearbook at http://unescostat.unesco.org/yearbook/ybframe.htm. There you?ll be able to get information on school enrollment, educational attainment, public spending on scientific research and the numbers of newspapers, newspaper readers and radio and television receivers in each country. Select a specific topic in the left frame and then an area of the world on the right to get to the data.

What if you need a comment from a foreign government's representative?

The Electronic Embassy Web site at http://www.embassy.org/embassies/index.html has an alphabetical list of the foreign embassies in Washington, D.C., including their phone numbers and links to their Web home pages.

Another site, Embassy Web, has embassies, consulates and trade missions in various U.S. cities and around the world. Go to Embassy Web is at http://www.embpage.org, then click on ?Diplomatic Offices? on the left.

And to find the official home pages of foreign governments, try the University of Michigan Documents Center?s Foreign Government Resources on the Web. The Documents Center at http://www.lib.umich.edu/libhome/Documents.center/foreign.html has a very comprehensive list of Web sites for foreign nations, as well as links to other resources on foreign countries.

Finally, for general information on foreign relations, try the World Wide Web Virtual Library?s International Affairs Resources Page at http://www.etown.edu/vl/. There you?ll find lists of foreign news sources online, resources on specific topics in international affairs, and international organizations and university research centers on the Web.