[CRConrad]

> Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom (which is also a country).

Depending on how you define "country", of course. The definition that makes Scotland "a country" seems mostly historical and peculiarly British. (One would think that also makes Northern Ireland "a country". Is it? Or Cornwall? If not, why not?)

In ordinary day-to-day language, though, "a country" is mostly synonymous with "a sovereign nation", which Scotland isn't. As several comments in this discussion have shown, it seems mostly to be a question of recognition by others, mainly neighbours. Scotland's closest neighbour, the United Kingdom, certainly doesn't seem to recognise it as a sovereign nation. As for international consensus, the closest proxy seems to be membership of the United Nations. Which Scotland has as much as Sealand does. (Perhaps the easiest way to see the conflicting interpretations is that something can't by definition be sovereign if it's part of something else.)

So "Scotland is a country" is true for some values of "country", but not all. (And IMnshO, not the most pertinent ones.)