Europe has a new country. Or at least that is what a tiny territory between Serbia and Croatia is claiming. The Free Republic of Liberland (commonly known as Liberland) has failed to get international recognition, but its leaders are actually claiming control of a land that no other country seems interested in owning. While Liberland is unlikely to become anything more than a curious geographic anecdote, its existence raises questions about the meaning of statehood.
Since the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s, Serbia and Croatia have each claimed several territories along their border, including some islands on the Danube River, that have been put to international arbitration. But in early 2015, Vit Jedlicka, a Czech politician and activist, found a small parcel of land on the western bank of the Danube that is not claimed by either side. And so on April 13, 2015 (Thomas Jefferson's birthday), Jedlicka proclaimed the birth of Liberland, Europe's newest nation. Its name may sound impressive, but its territory is not: Liberland's area is about 7 square kilometers (2.7 square miles) and is mostly covered by forest. It has no residents, and according to local media it has only an old house that has been abandoned for decades.
Jedlicka's critics have accused him of creating Liberland as a publicity stunt, and the Serbian and Croatian governments have minimized the issue. But the case is notable because the Serbian government told American media in 2015 that Liberland would not theoretically violate its territory, since the area is not on Serbian land. Croatia has admitted that the area "is still the subject of negotiations" between Zagreb and Belgrade but said it should be awarded to either of the two countries, not to a third party. Liberland bases its claim to existence on the argument that no nation has claimed ownership of the area. This would represent a case of "terra nullius" (nobody's land), a concept that describes a territory that is not under the sovereignty of any state and is subject to acquisition through occupation. The concept has existed for centuries and is widely accepted as a principle of international law. It has, however, created several disputes among countries, in many cases leading to war or international arbitration.
Liberland and other self-proclaimed microstates like it will have a difficult time if they truly want to become formal states (whether their self-proclaimed leaders actually have this goal remains a subject of debate). The most basic of the obstacles to formal statehood is to actually occupy the land they claim to own. And the fact that countries have not claimed ownership of certain territories does not mean they are not willing to react if they feel threatened by third parties.
