Guinea, officially Republic of Guinea , is a nation in West Africa, formerly known as French Guinea. Guinea's territory has a curved shape, with its base at the Atlantic Ocean, inland to the east, and turning south. The base borders Guinea-Bissau and Senegal to the north, and Mali to the north and north-east; the inland part borders Côte d'Ivoire to the south-east, Liberia to the south, and Sierra Leone to the west of the southern tip. Guinea is sometimes called Guinea-Conakry (Conakry being its capital,) to differentiate it from the neighboring Guinea-Bissau (whose capital is Bissau).