Here is a helpful table http://mandarin.about.com/od/vocabulary/a/europe.htm http://mandarin.about.com/od/vocabulary/a/europe.htm You can see that some name ar

Here is a helpful table http://mandarin.about.com/od/vocabulary/a/europe.htm http://mandarin.about.com/od/vocabulary/a/europe.htm You can see that some name are purely phonetic (finland, bielarus). A few however, ends with 国, which is the character for country. These names are actually significant (for instance, china is 中国, middle country (middle kingdom) and germany actually is brave country)