Wilayah

The governorates of Iraq (muhafazah) are sometimes translated as provinces, in contrast to official Iraqi documents and the general use for other Arab countries.

In Malay (both in Malaysian and Indonesian standards) and Tausug, wilayah or wilāya is a general word meaning "territory", "area" or "region".

The territory under the governance of the Islamic State (ISIS) is referred to them as officially being divided into wilayah,[3] often translated into English as "province".

The Persian word for province (velâyat) is still used in several similar forms in Central Asian countries: During the Soviet period the divisions of Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan were called oblasts and raions, using Russian terminology.

The Persian word for province (velâyat) is still used in several similar forms in South Asian countries as well: (Pashto: ولايت, wilāyat, plural: ولايتونه, wilāyatuna), subdivided into districts (Pashto: ولسوالۍ, wuləswāləi or Persian: ولسوالی, wolaswālī) In Urdu, the term Vilayat is used to refer to any foreign country.