Strasbourg is the capital and principal city of the Alsace région in NE France. With 702,412 inhabitants in 2007, its metropolitan area is the ninth largest in France. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the préfecture (capital) of the Bas-Rhin département and is an important centre of manufacturing and engineering, as well as road, rail, and river communications. The port of Strasbourg is the second largest on the Rhine after Duisburg, Germany. The city is the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine and is also the seat of several European institutions such as the Council of Europe with its European Court of Human Rights, its European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines and its European Audiovisual Observatory, the Eurocorps as well as the European Parliament and the European Ombudsman of the EU. Strasbourg's historic city centre, the Grande Île ("Big Island"), was classified a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 1988, the first time such an honor was placed on an entire city centre. Strasbourg is fused into the Franco-German culture, and has been a bridge of unity between France and Germany for centuries, especially because of its University and the co-existence of Catholic and Protestant culture. Reference: Wikipedia