This Friday, April 20, Apple will be releasing the new iPad in Brunei, Croatia, Cyprus, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Malaysia, Panama, South Korea, St Maarten, Uruguay and Venezuela. Next Friday, April 27, Apple will be adding Colombia, Estonia, India, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, South Africa and Thailand to the list as well. That's a total of 22 new countries.

The new iPad first launched on March 16 in the U.S., Australia, Canada, the U.K. and 8 other regions, and on March 25 in Italy, Spain, Ireland, Mexico, and 21 other regions

While the original iPad and iPad 2 were US-only for a month and had slow international rollouts, often attributed to constraints in screen supplies, the new iPad's release schedule has been incredibly aggressive, especially considering it requires Retina display panels.

If you're in one of the regions getting the new iPad over the next two weeks let us know -- are you buying one, did you buy one already in another region, or are you still waiting for now?

Full press release below.

New iPad Arrives in South Korea & 11 Additional Countries This Week

CUPERTINO, California―April 16, 2012―Apple® today announced the new iPad®, the third generation of its category defining mobile device, will arrive in South Korea and 11 additional countries on Friday, April 20. The new iPad features a stunning new Retina™ display, Apple’s new A5X chip with quad-core graphics and a 5 megapixel iSight® camera with advanced optics for capturing amazing photos and 1080p HD video. The new iPad still delivers the same all-day 10 hour battery life* while remaining amazingly thin and light.

In addition to South Korea, the new iPad also will be available beginning on Friday, April 20 in Brunei, Croatia, Cyprus, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Malaysia, Panama, St Maarten, Uruguay and Venezuela. Beginning on Friday, April 27, the new iPad will be available in Colombia, Estonia, India, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, South Africa and Thailand.

The new iPad Wi-Fi models will be available in black or white for a suggested retail price of $499 (US) for the 16GB model, $599 (US) for the 32GB model and $699 (US) for the 64GB model. The iPad Wi-Fi + 4G models will be available for a suggested retail price of $629 (US) for the 16GB model, $729 (US) for the 32GB model and $829 (US) for the 64GB model.** The new iPad will be sold through the Apple Online Store (www.apple.com) and select Apple Authorized Resellers. Additionally, iPad 2 is available at a more affordable price starting at just $399.

Apple has announced they're rolling out the iTunes Store to Brazilian and a number of Latin American countries, including Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru and Venezuela.

iTunes in the Cloud is available today for free in Brazil and Latin America and iTunes Match is available today for a $24.99 annual fee in Brazil.

The iTunes Store in Brazil offers over a thousand movies to rent or purchase, with many in stunning HD, from major studios including 20th Century Fox, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, Universal Pictures, The Walt Disney Studios and Warner Bros. Pictures. The iTunes Store in Brazil now joins the revolutionary App Store™, which offers more than 500,000 apps to consumers in 123 countries, reaching hundreds of millions of iPad, iPhone and iPod touch® users around the world. Customers have downloaded more than 18 billion apps to date.

Brazil before Canada or the UK? Oh Apple, you tease. Hit the source for the full press release from Apple. Any Brazilian or Latin American readers excited to finally be included in the Apple ecosystem?

Source: Apple

iPad is now available in China, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru, as previously announced, and it looks like celebrating new Apple gears is a cross-cultural, seemingly universal phenomena.

[Han Ziwen became the first iPad owner in mainland China today, and was carried out of the Beijing Apple store on employees' shoulders. He even made a t-shirt for the occasion: "I BUY IPAD NO 1". Image via Getty]

Cue the folk music. Then go enjoy your new iPads.

[Gizmodo]

iPad continues its international roll-out, heading for China, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru on September 17.

China gets Wi-Fi only:

iPad Wi-Fi models in China will be available for a suggested retail price of CNY3988 for 16GB, CNY4788 for 32GB and CNY5588 for 64GB. iPad will be sold in China through Apple’s Retail Stores, and select Apple Authorized Resellers.

Latin America gets all models:

Todos los modelos iPad estarán disponibles en Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador y Perú este viernes 17 de septiembre. Para conocer la disponibilidad específica por tienda, por favor visite: http://latam.apple.com/la/buy/

Given pervious international iPad rollouts, and that iPad 3G has been sold unlocked and carrier free even in the US, no doubt there are plenty roaming these nations already. Still, nice to have it all local and official-like, right?

[Apple PR, Apple PR via AppleInsider]

Back on July 11, the iPhone 3G launched in 22 countries. Along with much fanfare, hippie attention seekers, lines that would stretch out for weeks on end, and constantly crashing servers. But since Apple sold about a million of the hot new handsets that weekend, you just knew they were going to do it again.

"Today" brings phase 2, where 21 more countries are supposed to come online with the iPhone 3G. (Officially Aug. 22nd, which may or may not be "today" to you depending on your timezone). How are things going so far? Reader Anton was gracious enough to send in this report (thanks Anton!):

Now it's midnight in Estonia and I'm at the iphone launch event. No special frenzy, about 1000 people in one supermarket, a couple of DJs and a lot of light. There's just two plans offered: us$55 and $89. First one includes 100 minutes, 100 SMS and 100 Mb; the other one - 250 of each. Every extra megabyte will cost $.25 and $.21 respectively. The phone itself is $267/8Gb and $396/16Gb with $55 plan and $149/8Gb and $278/16Gb with $89 plan.

Ouch! When will telcos worldwide realize what Henry Ford did almost 100 years ago. Mass pricing leads to mass adoption which leads to mass profits. Sheesh!

So are you standing in line right this very minute, ready to get your shiny new iPhone today? Is your carrier up? Is iTunes activating? Let us know how things are going!

And if your market still doesn't have the iPhone 3G, just remember that Apple promised another 30+ countries -- a grand total of 70+ -- for 2008, which is now set to include Russia via MTS. That pretty much leaves China standing alone as the last major market sans carrier deal... for now.

20 countries launched the iPhone 3G back on July 11 (okay, zut, France straggled a bit), and Apple hopes to launch some 21 more just 6 short weeks later -- only minus some iTunes authentication failures and supply shortages, no doubt.

From iLounge, we learn who's next:

Romania, India, the Philippines, Estonia, the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Paraguay, Peru, and Uruguay, four additional countries will see launches. Latvia and Lithuania will see the device launched on TeliaSonera’s LMT and Omnitel services, respectively, while T-Mobile and Orange will launch the iPhone in Slovakia, and SingTel will begin offering the device in Singapore.

This will bring the grand total to some 43, with almost 30 more still slated by close of year, 2008. Looks like Apple may need those 40 million units after all, doesn't it?