paragraph_text: The Mississippi River is the chief river of the second - largest drainage system on the North American continent, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. Flowing entirely in the United States (although its drainage basin reaches into Canada), it rises in northern Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for 2,320 miles (3,730 km) to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains all or parts of 31 U.S. states and 2 Canadian provinces between the Rocky and Appalachian Mountains. The Mississippi ranks as the fourth - longest and fifteenth - largest river in the world by discharge. The river either borders or passes through the states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana.

paragraph_text: From the 1880s to 1914, the European powers expanded their control across the African continent, competing with each other for Africa’s land and resources. Great Britain controlled various colonial holdings in East Africa that spanned the length of the African continent from Egypt in the north to South Africa. The French gained major ground in West Africa, and the Portuguese held colonies in southern Africa. Germany, Italy, and Spain established a small number of colonies at various points throughout the continent, which included German East Africa (Tanganyika) and German Southwest Africa for Germany, Eritrea and Libya for Italy, and the Canary Islands and Rio de Oro in northwestern Africa for Spain. Finally, for King Leopold (ruled from 1865–1909), there was the large “piece of that great African cake” known as the Congo, which, unfortunately for the native Congolese, became his personal fiefdom to do with as he pleased in Central Africa. By 1914, almost the entire continent was under European control. Liberia, which was settled by freed American slaves in the 1820s, and Abyssinia (Ethiopia) in eastern Africa were the last remaining independent African states. (John Merriman, A History of Modern Europe, Volume Two: From the French Revolution to the Present, Third Edition (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2010), pp. 819–859).

paragraph_text: Blizzard Mountain Ski Area is a modest ski area in the western United States, in central Idaho. It is located in the southern tip of the Pioneer Mountains in southwestern Butte County, southwest of Arco. The elevation of its lift-served summit is above sea level, with a vertical drop of on a treeless, northeast-facing slope. The summit offers a sweeping view of the vast Snake River Plain to the east, south, and west.

paragraph_text: Henry Shelton Sanford (June 15, 1823 – May 21, 1891) was a wealthy American diplomat, businessman, and aristocrat from Connecticut who served as United States Minister to Belgium from 1861 to 1869. He is also known for founding the city of Sanford, Florida and for successfully lobbying the United States into recognizing King Leopold II's claim to the Congo region in central Africa, the area that would become Leopold's privately controlled Congo Free State.

paragraph_text: The Mississippi River is the chief river of the second - largest drainage system on the North American continent, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. The stream is entirely within the United States (although its drainage basin reaches into Canada), its source is Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota and it flows generally south for 2,320 miles (3,730 km) to the Mississippi River Delta in the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains all or parts of 31 U.S. states and two Canadian provinces between the Rocky and Appalachian Mountains. The Mississippi ranks as the fourth - longest and fifteenth - largest river in the world by discharge. The river either borders or passes through the states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana.

paragraph_text: The Oloy River () is a river in Magadan Oblast in Russia, a right tributary of the Omolon River (Kolyma's basin). The length of the river is . The area of its drainage basin is 23,100 km². It flows roughly northwestwards and passes through the sparsely populated areas of Chukotka. This river meets the Kolyma at Kryukovo.

paragraph_text: Rupen River is a river in Gujarat in western India whose origin is the Taranga hills. Its drainage basin has a maximum length of 156 km. The total catchment area of the basin is .

paragraph_text: The major European powers laid claim to the areas of Africa where they could exhibit a sphere of influence over the area. These claims did not have to have any substantial land holdings or treaties to be legitimate. The European power that demonstrated its control over a territory accepted the mandate to rule that region as a national colony. The European nation that held the claim developed and benefited from their colony’s commercial interests without having to fear rival European competition. With the colonial claim came the underlying assumption that the European power that exerted control would use its mandate to offer protection and provide welfare for its colonial peoples, however, this principle remained more theory than practice. There were many documented instances of material and moral conditions deteriorating for native Africans in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries under European colonial rule, to the point where the colonial experience for them has been described as "hell on earth."

paragraph_text: The Portuguese explorer Diogo Cão reached the mouth of the Congo in 1484. Commercial relationships quickly grew between the inland Bantu kingdoms and European merchants who traded various commodities, manufactured goods, and people captured from the hinterlands. After centuries as a major hub for transatlantic trade, direct European colonization of the Congo river delta began in the late 19th century, subsequently eroding the power of the Bantu societies in the region.

paragraph_text: The Battle of Mohi (today Muhi), also known as Battle of the Sajó River or Battle of the Tisza River (11 April 1241), was the main battle between the Mongol Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary during the Mongol invasion of Europe. It took place at Muhi, southwest of the Sajó River. After the invasion, Hungary lay in ruins. Nearly half of the inhabited places had been destroyed by the invading armies. Around 15–25 percent of the population was lost, mostly in lowland areas, especially in the Great Hungarian Plain, the southern reaches of the Hungarian plain in the area now called the Banat and in southern Transylvania.

paragraph_text: Beaumont lies on Texas' coastal plain, about 30 miles (48 km) inland from the Gulf of Mexico, one hour drive east of Houston, and just south of the dense pine forests of East Texas. The city is bordered on the east by the Neches River and to the north by Pine Island Bayou. Before being settled, the area was crisscrossed by numerous small streams. Most of these streams have since been filled in or converted for drainage purposes. The island directly across from Riverfront Park is called Trinity Island. There are also three other islands in the Neches River around the downtown area / port: Harbor, Smith and Clark.

paragraph_text: Mayombe (or Mayumbe) is a geographic area on the western coast of Africa occupied by low mountains extending from the mouth of the Congo River in the south to the Kouilou-Niari River to the north. The area includes parts of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Angola (Cabinda Province), the Republic of the Congo and Gabon.

paragraph_text: The Beaverhead River is an approximately tributary of the Jefferson River in southwest Montana (east of the Continental Divide). It drains an area of roughly . The river's original headwaters, formed by the confluence of the Red Rock River and Horse Prairie Creek, are now flooded under Clark Canyon Reservoir, which also floods the first of the river. The Beaverhead then flows through a broad valley northward to join the Big Hole River and form the Jefferson River. With the Red Rock River included in its length, the river stretches another , for a total length of , one of the more significant drainages of south-western Montana.

paragraph_text: The Berlin Conference (German: Kongokonferenz or ``Congo Conference '') of 1884 -- 85 regulated European colonization and trade in Africa during the Imperialism period, and coincided with Germany's sudden emergence as an imperial power. Called for by Portugal and organized by Otto von Bismarck, first Chancellor of Germany, its outcome, the General Act of the Berlin Conference, can be seen as the formalization of the Scramble for Africa. The conference ushered in a period of heightened colonial activity by European powers, while simultaneously eliminating most existing forms of African autonomy and self - governance. During this colonial time, the economy of Africa was re-arranged to serve Europe and Europeans, and the European industrial chain began in Africa and ended in European industrial warehouses.

paragraph_text: Mil plain is a plain in Azerbaijan. It is located on the bank of the Aras river and extends to Iran. Mil-plain is located in the southwest part of the Kur-Araz lowland, where the Kura and Araz rivers meet. The area is between the right bank of the Kura River and the left bank of the Araz River. The north-eastern part of the plain is lower than the ocean level. In the south-west, these areas are covered by sand, gravel. More than 40 percent of the altitude in the plain is 0-100 meters, 25 percent - 100-200 meters above sea level, and 35 percent - absolute altitude is less than 0 meters. The absolute altitude decreases about 8 m to north (to the Kura River) and varies from 200 to 250 to the west (harami plain). The plain includes mainly the areas of Imishli and Beylagan districts. Seismic activity is high as the plain is in the convergent border the Alpine-Himalayan orogenic belt.

paragraph_text: Pingtung Plain () is a plain area including parts of Pingtung County and Kaohsiung City in Taiwan. It includes the alluvial fan of Kaoping River, which forms the largest drainage area of rivers in Taiwan, and also passed by other shorter rivers such as Tungkang River, Linbian River and Shihwen River (士文溪). The plain faces the Taiwan Strait on the southwest, lies to the east of Kaohsiung City, and at the west of Central Mountain Range.

paragraph_text: The southwest of the country is a coastal plain for which the primary drainage is the Kouilou-Niari River; the interior of the country consists of a central plateau between two basins to the south and north. Forests are under increasing exploitation pressure.

paragraph_text: Sustut Peak, 2481 m (8140 ft), prominence: 1231 m, is the highest summit in the drainage of the Sustut River in British Columbia, Canada. Located in the Hogem Ranges west of Sustut Lake, which is at the Sustut River's headwaters, it is 8 km southwest of the road to the Kemess Mine

paragraph_text: Gibson Lake is a lake in geographic Biggar Township, Nipissing District in Northeastern Ontario, Canada. It is in the Saint Lawrence River drainage basin and lies within Algonquin Provincial Park. The major outflow, at the southwest, is Gibson Creek which flows to the Nipissing River, and then via the Petawawa River and the Ottawa River to the Saint Lawrence River.

paragraph_text: Jalaur River, also known as Jalaud River, is the second longest river in Panay island and the second largest by drainage basin, only Panay River in Capiz has the longest and the largest river system in Panay. Jalaur river ranked 17th largest river system in the Philippines in terms of drainage basin size. It has an estimated drainage area of and travels from its source to its mouth in the Guimaras Strait. It drains the eastern portion of the island and traverses through Passi City and the towns of Leganes, Zarraga, Dumangas, Barotac Nuevo, Pototan, Dingle, San Enrique, Duenas, and Calinog.

Question: How did the claims on the areas in the continent where the river that serves as a drainage for the southwest plain of the Congo is located benefit European powers?
Answer: colony’s commercial interests without having to fear rival European competition.