China

continuing talks and confidence-building measures work toward

reducing tensions over Kashmir that nonetheless remains militarized

with portions under the de facto administration of China (Aksai

Chin), India (Jammu and Kashmir), and Pakistan (Azad Kashmir and

Northern Areas); India does not recognize Pakistan's ceding historic

Kashmir lands to China in 1964; China and India continue their

security and foreign policy dialogue started in 2005 related to the

dispute over most of their rugged, militarized boundary, regional

nuclear proliferation, and other matters; China claims most of

India's Arunachal Pradesh to the base of the Himalayas; lacking any

treaty describing the boundary, Bhutan and China continue

negotiations to establish a common boundary alignment to resolve

territorial disputes due to cartographic discrepancies; Chinese maps

show an international boundary symbol off the coasts of the littoral

states of the South China Seas, where China has interrupted

Vietnamese hydrocarbon exploration; China asserts sovereignty over

the Spratly Islands together with Malaysia, Philippines, Taiwan,

Vietnam, and possibly Brunei; the 2002 "Declaration on the Conduct

of Parties in the South China Sea" eased tensions in the Spratly's

but is not the legally binding "code of conduct" sought by some

parties; Vietnam and China continue to expand construction of

facilities in the Spratly's and in March 2005, the national oil

companies of China, the Philippines, and Vietnam signed a joint

accord on marine seismic activities in the Spratly Islands; China

occupies some of the Paracel Islands also claimed by Vietnam and

Taiwan; China and Taiwan continue to reject both Japan's claims to

the uninhabited islands of Senkaku-shoto (Diaoyu Tai) and Japan's

unilaterally declared equidistance line in the East China Sea, the

site of intensive hydrocarbon exploration and exploitation; certain

islands in the Yalu and Tumen rivers are in dispute with North

Korea; North Korea and China seek to stem illegal migration to China

by North Koreans, fleeing privations and oppression, by building a

fence along portions of the border and imprisoning North Koreans

deported by China; China and Russia have demarcated the once

disputed islands at the Amur and Ussuri confluence and in the Argun

River in accordance with their 2004 Agreement; China and Tajikistan

have begun demarcating the revised boundary agreed to in the

delimitation of 2002; the decade-long demarcation of the

China-Vietnam land boundary is expected to be completed by the end

of 2008, while the maritime boundary delimitation and fisheries

agreements in the Gulf of Tonkin, ratified in June 2004, have been

implemented; citing environmental, cultural, and social concerns,

China has reconsidered construction of 13 dams on the Salween River,

but energy-starved Burma, with backing from Thailand, remains intent

on building five hydro-electric dams downstream despite regional and

international protests; Chinese and Hong Kong authorities met in

March 2008 to resolve ownership and use of lands recovered in

Shenzhen River channelization, including 96-hectare Lok Ma Chau

Loop; Hong Kong developing plans to reduce 2,000 out of 2,800

hectares of its restricted Closed Area by 2010

Christmas Island

none

Clipperton Island

none

Cocos (Keeling) Islands

none

Colombia

in December 2007, ICJ allocates San Andres, Providencia,

and Santa Catalina islands to Colombia under 1928 Treaty but does

not rule on 82 degrees W meridian as maritime boundary with

Nicaragua; managed dispute with Venezuela over maritime boundary and

Venezuelan-administered Los Monjes Islands near the Gulf of

Venezuela; Colombian-organized illegal narcotics, guerrilla, and

paramilitary activities penetrate all neighboring borders and have

caused Colombian citizens to flee mostly into neighboring countries;

Colombia, Honduras, Nicaragua, Jamaica, and the US assert various

claims to Bajo Nuevo and Serranilla Bank

Comoros

claims French-administered Mayotte and challenges France's

and Madagascar's claims to Banc du Geyser, a drying reef in the

Mozambique Channel; in May 2008, African Union forces are called in

to assist the Comoros military recapture Anjouan Island from rebels

who seized it in 2001

Congo, Democratic Republic of the

heads of the Great Lakes states

and UN pledged in 2004 to abate tribal, rebel, and militia fighting

in the region, including northeast Congo, where the UN Organization

Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC), organized

in 1999, maintains over 16,500 uniformed peacekeepers; members of

Uganda's Lords Resistance Army forces continue to seek refuge in

Congo's Garamba National Park as peace talks with the Uganda

government evolve; the location of the boundary in the broad Congo

River with the Republic of the Congo is indefinite except in the

Pool Malebo/Stanley Pool area; Uganda and DROC dispute Rukwanzi

island in Lake Albert and other areas on the Semliki River with

hydrocarbon potential; boundary commission continues discussions

over Congolese-administered triangle of land on the right bank of

the Lunkinda river claimed by Zambia near the DROC village of Pweto

Congo, Republic of the

the location of the boundary in the broad

Congo River with the Democratic Republic of the Congo is indefinite

except in the Pool Malebo/Stanley Pool area

Cook Islands

none

Coral Sea Islands

none

Costa Rica

the ICJ has given Costa Rica until January 2008 to reply

and Nicaragua until July 2008 to rejoin before rendering its

decision on the navigation, security, and commercial rights of Costa

Rican vessels on the Rio San Juan over which Nicaragua retains

sovereignty

Cote d'Ivoire

despite the presence of over 9,000 UN forces (UNOCI)

in Cote d'Ivoire since 2004, ethnic conflict still leaves displaced

hundreds of thousands of Ivorians in and out of the country as well

as driven out migrants from neighboring states who worked in Ivorian

cocoa plantations; the March 2007 peace deal between Ivorian rebels

and the government brought significant numbers of rebels out of

hiding in neighboring states

Croatia

dispute remains with Bosnia and Herzegovina over several

small sections of the boundary related to maritime access that

hinders ratification of the 1999 border agreement; the

Croatia-Slovenia land and maritime boundary agreement, which would

have ceded most of Pirin Bay and maritime access to Slovenia and

several villages to Croatia, remains unratified and in dispute;

Slovenia also protests Croatia's 2003 claim to an exclusive economic

zone in the Adriatic; as a European Union peripheral state, Slovenia

imposed a hard border Schengen regime with non-member Croatia in

December 2007

Cuba

US Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay is leased to US and only mutual

agreement or US abandonment of the facility can terminate the lease

Cyprus

hostilities in 1974 divided the island into two de facto

autonomous entities, the internationally recognized Cypriot

Government and a Turkish-Cypriot community (north Cyprus); the

1,000-strong UN Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) has served in

Cyprus since 1964 and maintains the buffer zone between north and

south; on 1 May 2004, Cyprus entered the European Union still

divided, with the EU's body of legislation and standards (acquis

communitaire) suspended in the north; Turkey protests Cypriot

Government creating hydrocarbon blocks and maritime boundary with

Lebanon in March 2007

Czech Republic

while threats of international legal action never

materialized in 2007, 915,220 Austrians, with the support of the

popular Freedom Party, signed a petition in January 2008, demanding

that Austria block the Czech Republic's accession to the EU unless

Prague closes its controversial Soviet-style nuclear plant in

Temelin, bordering Austria

Denmark

Iceland, the UK, and Ireland dispute Denmark's claim that

the Faroe Islands' continental shelf extends beyond 200 nm; Faroese

continue to study proposals for full independence; sovereignty

dispute with Canada over Hans Island in the Kennedy Channel between

Ellesmere Island and Greenland

Djibouti

Djibouti maintains economic ties and border accords with

"Somaliland" leadership while maintaining some political ties to

various factions in Somalia; Kuwait is chief investor in the 2008

restoration and upgrade of the Ethiopian-Djibouti rail link

Dominica

Dominica is the only Caribbean state to challenge

Venezuela's sovereignty claim over Aves Island and joins the other

island nations in challenging whether the feature sustains human

habitation, a criterion under the UN Convention on the Law of the

Sea (UNCLOS), which permits Venezuela to extend its Exclusive

Economic Zone (EEZ) and continental shelf claims over a large

portion of the eastern Caribbean Sea

Dominican Republic

Haitian migrants cross the porous border into the

Dominican Republic to find work; illegal migrants from the Dominican

Republic cross the Mona Passage each year to Puerto Rico to find

better work

Ecuador

organized illegal narcotics operations in Colombia penetrate

across Ecuador's shared border, which thousands of Colombians also

cross to escape the violence in their home country

Egypt

while Sudan retains claim to the Hala'ib Triangle north of the

1899 Treaty boundary along the 22nd Parallel, both states withdrew

their military presence in the 1990s and Egypt has invested in and

effectively administers the area; Egypt no longer shows its

administration of the Bir Tawil trapezoid in Sudan on its maps;

Gazan breaches in the security wall with Egypt in January 2008

highlight difficulties in monitoring the Sinai border

El Salvador

International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled on the

delimitation of "bolsones" (disputed areas) along the El

Salvador-Honduras boundary, in 1992, with final agreement by the

parties in 2006 after an Organization of American States (OAS)

survey and a further ICJ ruling in 2003; the 1992 ICJ ruling advised

a tripartite resolution to a maritime boundary in the Gulf of

Fonseca advocating Honduran access to the Pacific; El Salvador

continues to claim tiny Conejo Island, not identified in the ICJ

decision, off Honduras in the Gulf of Fonseca

Equatorial Guinea

in 2002, ICJ ruled on an equidistance settlement

of Cameroon-Equatorial Guinea-Nigeria maritime boundary in the Gulf

of Guinea, but a dispute between Equatorial Guinea and Cameroon over

an island at the mouth of the Ntem River and imprecisely defined

maritime coordinates in the ICJ decision delay final delimitation;

UN urges Equatorial Guinea and Gabon to resolve the sovereignty

dispute over Gabon-occupied Mbane and lesser islands and to create a

maritime boundary in the hydrocarbon-rich Corisco Bay

Eritrea

Eritrea and Ethiopia agreed to abide by 2002

Ethiopia-Eritrea Boundary Commission's (EEBC) delimitation decision

but, neither party responded to the revised line detailed in the

November 2006 EEBC Demarcation Statement; UN Peacekeeping Mission to

Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE), which has monitored the 25-km-wide

Temporary Security Zone in Eritrea since 2000, is extended for six

months in 2007 despite Eritrean restrictions on its operations and

reduced force of 17,000; Sudan accuses Eritrea of supporting eastern

Sudanese rebel groups

Estonia

Russia recalled its signature to the 1996 technical border

agreement with Estonia in 2005, rather than concede to Estonia's

appending prepared a unilateral declaration referencing Soviet

occupation and territorial losses; Russia demands better

accommodation of Russian-speaking population in Estonia; Estonian

citizen groups continue to press for realignment of the boundary

based on the 1920 Tartu Peace Treaty that would bring the now

divided ethnic Setu people and parts of the Narva region within

Estonia; as a member state that forms part of the EU's external

border, Estonia must implement the strict Schengen border rules with

Russia

Ethiopia

Eritrea and Ethiopia agreed to abide by the 2002

Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission's (EEBC) delimitation decision,

but neither party responded to the revised line detailed in the

November 2006 EEBC Demarcation Statement; UN Peacekeeping Mission to

Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE), which has monitored the 25-km-wide

Temporary Security Zone in Eritrea since 2000, is extended for six

months in 2007 despite Eritrean restrictions on its operations and

reduced force of 17,000; the undemarcated former British

administrative line has little meaning as a political separation to

rival clans within Ethiopia's Ogaden and southern Somalia's Oromo

region; Ethiopian forces invaded southern Somalia and routed

Islamist Courts from Mogadishu in January 2007; "Somaliland"

secessionists provide port facilities in Berbera and trade ties to

landlocked Ethiopia; civil unrest in eastern Sudan has hampered

efforts to demarcate the porous boundary with Ethiopia

European Union

as a political union, the EU has no border disputes

with neighboring countries, but Estonia has no land boundary

agreements with Russia, Slovenia disputes its land and maritime

boundaries with Croatia, and Spain has territorial and maritime

disputes with Morocco and with the UK over Gibraltar; the EU has set

up a Schengen area - consisting of 22 EU member states that have

signed the convention implementing the Schengen agreements or

"acquis" (1985 and 1990) on the free movement of persons and the

harmonization of border controls in Europe; these agreements became

incorporated into EU law with the implementation of the 1997 Treaty

of Amsterdam on 1 May 1999; in addition, non-EU states Iceland and

Norway (as part of the Nordic Union) have been included in the

Schengen area since 1996 (full members in 2001), and Switzerland

since 2008 bringing the total current membership to 25; the UK

(since 2000) and Ireland (since 2002) take part in only some aspects

of the Schengen area, especially with respect to police and criminal

matters; nine of the 12 new member states that joined the EU since

2004 joined Schengen on 21 December 2007; of the three remaining EU

states, Cyprus is expected to join by 2009, while Romania and

Bulgaria continue to enhance their border security systems

Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas)

Argentina, which claims the

islands in its constitution and briefly occupied them by force in

1982, agreed in 1995 to no longer seek settlement by force; UK

continues to reject Argentine requests for sovereignty talks

Faroe Islands

because anticipated offshore hydrocarbon resources

have not been realized, earlier Faroese proposals for full

independence have been deferred; Iceland, the UK, and Ireland

dispute Denmark's claim that the Faroe Islands' continental shelf

extends beyond 200 nm

Fiji

none

Finland

various groups in Finland advocate restoration of Karelia

and other areas ceded to the Soviet Union, but the Finnish

Government asserts no territorial demands

France

Madagascar claims the French territories of Bassas da India,

Europa Island, Glorioso Islands, and Juan de Nova Island; Comoros

claims Mayotte; Mauritius claims Tromelin Island; territorial

dispute between Suriname and the French overseas department of

French Guiana; France asserts a territorial claim in Antarctica

(Adelie Land); France and Vanuatu claim Matthew and Hunter Islands,

east of New Caledonia

French Polynesia

none

French Southern and Antarctic Lands

French claim to "Adelie Land" in

Antarctica is not recognized by the US

Bassas da India, Europa Island, Glorioso Islands, Juan de Nova

Island (Iles Eparses): claimed by Madagascar

Tromelin Island (Iles Eparses): claimed by Mauritius

Gabon

UN urges Equatorial Guinea and Gabon to resolve the

sovereignty dispute over Gabon-occupied Mbane Island and lesser

islands and to establish a maritime boundary in hydrocarbon-rich

Corisco Bay

Gambia, The

attempts to stem refugees, cross-border raids, arms

smuggling, and other illegal activities by separatists from southern

Senegal's Casamance region, as well as from conflicts in other west

African states

Gaza Strip

West Bank and Gaza Strip are Israeli-occupied with

current status subject to the Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement

- permanent status to be determined through further negotiation;

Israel removed settlers and military personnel from the Gaza Strip

in August 2005

Georgia

Russia and Georgia agree on delimiting 80% of their common

border, leaving certain small, strategic segments and the maritime

boundary unresolved; OSCE observers monitor volatile areas such as

the Pankisi Gorge in the Akhmeti region and the Argun Gorge in

Abkhazia; UN Observer Mission in Georgia has maintained a

peacekeeping force in Georgia since 1993; Meshkheti Turks scattered

throughout the former Soviet Union seek to return to Georgia;

boundary with Armenia remains undemarcated; ethnic Armenian groups

in Javakheti region of Georgia seek greater autonomy from the

Georgian government; Azerbaijan and Georgia continue to discuss the

alignment of their boundary at certain crossing areas

Germany

none

Ghana

Ghana struggles to accommodate returning nationals who worked

in the cocoa plantations and escaped fighting in Cote d'Ivoire

Gibraltar

in 2002, Gibraltar residents voted overwhelmingly by

referendum to reject any "shared sovereignty" arrangement; the

government of Gibraltar insists on equal participation in talks

between the UK and Spain; Spain disapproves of UK plans to grant

Gibraltar even greater autonomy

Greece

Greece and Turkey continue discussions to resolve their

complex maritime, air, territorial, and boundary disputes in the

Aegean Sea; Cyprus question with Turkey; Greece rejects the use of

the name Macedonia or Republic of Macedonia; the mass migration of

unemployed Albanians still remains a problem for developed

countries, chiefly Greece and Italy

Greenland

managed dispute between Canada and Denmark over Hans

Island in the Kennedy Channel between Canada's Ellesmere Island and

Greenland

Grenada

none

Guam

none

Guatemala

annual ministerial meetings under the OAS-initiated

Agreement on the Framework for Negotiations and Confidence Building

Measures continue to address Guatemalan land and maritime claims in

Belize and the Caribbean Sea; the Line of Adjacency created under

the 2002 Differendum serves in lieu of the contiguous international

boundary to control squatting in the sparsely inhabited rain forests

of Belize's border region; Mexico must deal with thousands of

impoverished Guatemalans and other Central Americans who cross the

porous border looking for work in Mexico and the United States

Guernsey

none

Guinea

conflicts among rebel groups, warlords, and youth gangs in

neighboring states have spilled over into Guinea, resulting in

domestic instability; Sierra Leone considers Guinea's definition of

the flood plain limits to define the left bank boundary of the

Makona and Moa rivers excessive and protests Guinea's continued

occupation of these lands, including the hamlet of Yenga, occupied

since 1998

Guinea-Bissau

in 2006, political instability within Senegal's

Casamance region resulted in thousands of Senegalese refugees,

cross-border raids, and arms smuggling into Guinea-Bissau

Guyana

all of the area west of the Essequibo River is claimed by

Venezuela preventing any discussion of a maritime boundary; Guyana

has expressed its intention to join Barbados in asserting claims

before UNCLOS that Trinidad and Tobago's maritime boundary with

Venezuela extends into their waters; Suriname claims a triangle of

land between the New and Kutari/Koetari rivers in a historic dispute

over the headwaters of the Courantyne; Guyana seeks arbitration

under provisions of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)

to resolve the long-standing dispute with Suriname over the axis of

the territorial sea boundary in potentially oil-rich waters

Haiti

since 2004, about 8,000 peacekeepers from the UN Stabilization

Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) maintain civil order in Haiti; despite

efforts to control illegal migration, Haitians cross into the

Dominican Republic and sail to neighboring countries; Haiti claims

US-administered Navassa Island

Heard Island and McDonald Islands

none

Holy See (Vatican City)

none

Honduras

International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled on the

delimitation of "bolsones" (disputed areas) along the El

Salvador-Honduras border in 1992 with final settlement by the

parties in 2006 after an Organization of American States (OAS)

survey and a further ICJ ruling in 2003; the 1992 ICJ ruling advised

a tripartite resolution to a maritime boundary in the Gulf of

Fonseca with consideration of Honduran access to the Pacific; El

Salvador continues to claim tiny Conejo Island, not mentioned in the

ICJ ruling, off Honduras in the Gulf of Fonseca; Honduras claims the

Belizean-administered Sapodilla Cays off the coast of Belize in its

constitution, but agreed to a joint ecological park around the cays

should Guatemala consent to a maritime corridor in the Caribbean

under the OAS-sponsored 2002 Belize-Guatemala Differendum; memorials

and countermemorials were filed by the parties in Nicaragua's 1999

and 2001 proceedings against Honduras and Colombia at the ICJ over

the maritime boundary and territorial claims in the western

Caribbean Sea - final public hearings are scheduled for 2007

Hong Kong

none

Hungary

bilateral government, legal, technical and economic working

group negotiations continue in 2006 with Slovakia over Hungary's

failure to complete its portion of the Gabcikovo-Nagymaros

hydroelectric dam project along the Danube; as a member state that

forms part of the EU's external border, Hungary has implemented the

strict Schengen border rules

Iceland

Iceland, the UK, and Ireland dispute Denmark's claim that

the Faroe Islands' continental shelf extends beyond 200 nm

India

since China and India launched a security and foreign policy

dialogue in 2005, consolidated discussions related to the dispute

over most of their rugged, militarized boundary, regional nuclear

proliferation, Indian claims that China transferred missiles to

Pakistan, and other matters continue; various talks and

confidence-building measures have cautiously begun to defuse

tensions over Kashmir, particularly since the October 2005

earthquake in the region; Kashmir nevertheless remains the site of

the world's largest and most militarized territorial dispute with

portions under the de facto administration of China (Aksai Chin),

India (Jammu and Kashmir), and Pakistan (Azad Kashmir and Northern

Areas); India and Pakistan have maintained the 2004 cease fire in

Kashmir and initiated discussions on defusing the armed stand-off in

the Siachen glacier region; Pakistan protests India's fencing the

highly militarized Line of Control and construction of the Baglihar

Dam on the Chenab River in Jammu and Kashmir, which is part of the

larger dispute on water sharing of the Indus River and its

tributaries; UN Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan

(UNMOGIP) has maintained a small group of peacekeepers since 1949;

India does not recognize Pakistan's ceding historic Kashmir lands to

China in 1964; to defuse tensions and prepare for discussions on a

maritime boundary, India and Pakistan seek technical resolution of

the disputed boundary in Sir Creek estuary at the mouth of the Rann

of Kutch in the Arabian Sea; Pakistani maps continue to show its

Junagadh claim in Indian Gujarat State; discussions with Bangladesh

remain stalled to delimit a small section of river boundary, to

exchange territory for 51 Bangladeshi exclaves in India and 111

Indian exclaves in Bangladesh, to allocate divided villages, and to

stop illegal cross-border trade, migration, violence, and transit of

terrorists through the porous border; Bangladesh protests India's

attempts to fence off high-traffic sections of the border; dispute

with Bangladesh over New Moore/South Talpatty/Purbasha Island in the

Bay of Bengal deters maritime boundary delimitation; India seeks

cooperation from Bhutan and Burma to keep Indian Nagaland and Assam

separatists from hiding in remote areas along the borders; Joint

Border Committee with Nepal continues to examine contested boundary

sections, including the 400 square kilometer dispute over the source

of the Kalapani River; India maintains a strict border regime to

keep out Maoist insurgents and control illegal cross-border

activities from Nepal