[unkeen]

I was not talking about any of the points you mention, I was refering to the geographical facts alone. Wouldn't you agree that in general it is kind of silly to claim ownership of a piece of land that is far, far away from your own country?

[kdheiwns]

I was born in a country that has islands and I live in a different country that consists exclusively of islands. The islands spread out thousands of miles in various directions. Land being far apart is just a reality of how countries work.

The distance from London to Gibraltar is closer than the distance from London to Bermuda, but nobody finds that weird. France has French Polynesia on the opposite side of the world. Russia has Kaliningrad. Norway has Svalbard. South Africa has another country, Lesotho, right in the middle of it. India wraps around Bangladesh like a tentacle. Azerbaijan has a random piece of land and makes a sandwich out of Armenia. Spain has islands directly west of Morocco. France has land on South America.

The whole world has freaky borders. The only clean borders are places like Wyoming and Colorado.

[rmunn]

I would add natural navigation barriers such as rivers and lakes (and some, but not all, mountain ranges) to the list of "clean" borders. They're not straight lines, but they're a natural place to site a border.

[rmunn]

There are many, MANY islands scattered around Earth's oceans. Not all of them have the resources to be self-sufficient, so any inhabitants have to import goods from somewhere. There are two options: either each island is its own country, or some islands belong to some other country. Given how easy it is to navigate to most islands (some of them are in harder-to-navigate straits), it doesn't make much practical difference whether the owning country is close or far away.

So no, as a general rule I can't agree. I can certainly agree that there are some rather silly cases, but it's just not practical for all islands to be self-governing, so I can't agree with the general rule you propose.

[unkeen]

That may all be true, but you’re talking about voluntary affiliations here.

Colonies are rarely ceded voluntarily, but are usually the result of an invasion or a lost conflict. The fact that this is no longer the case with Gibraltar today, because its inhabitants value the benefits of belonging to Britain, is simply a consequence of the time that has passed since then. It does not automatically undo the imperialist actions of the past.