- published: 23 Jun 2012
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- author: Royal Wakefield
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![PACIFIC CRUISE (1951) [Cook Islands and Tokelau]](http://web.archive.org./web/20130101100126im_/http://i.ytimg.com/vi/5Dp7qRgKCQY/default.jpg "The story of a Royal New Zealand Navy ship's cruise among New Zealand's Island Territories in the Pacificn namely the Northern and Southern Cook Islands and Tokelau. Native sports and dances, the administration services, and the present day life of the Islands' people. B&W 18 mins. 35mm 1637 ft. DV file of Beta SP telecini of 35mm film.")
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American Samoa
American Samoa (/əˈmɛrɨkən səˈmoʊ.ə/ (
listen); Samoan: Amerika Sāmoa, IPA: [aˈmɛɾika ˌsaːˈmoa]; also Amelika Sāmoa or Sāmoa Amelika) is an unincorporated territory of the United States located in the South Pacific Ocean, southeast of the Independent State of Samoa (formerly known as Western Samoa). The main (largest and most populous) island is Tutuila, with the Manuʻa Islands, Rose Atoll, and Swains Island also included in the territory.
American Samoa is part of the Samoan Islands chain, located west of the Cook Islands, north of Tonga, and some 300 miles (500 km) south of Tokelau. To the west are the islands of the Wallis and Futuna group.
The 2010 census showed a total population of 55,519 people. The total land area is 76.1 square miles (197.1 km2), slightly more than Washington, D.C. American Samoa is the southernmost territory of the United States.
Contact with Europeans began in the early 18th century. Jacob Roggeveen (1659–1729), a Dutchman, was the first known European to sight the Samoan islands in 1722. This visit was followed by the French explorer Louis-Antoine de Bougainville (1729–1811), who named them the Navigator Islands in 1768. Contact was limited before the 1830s which is when English missionaries and traders began arriving.
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Anguilla
Anguilla (
/æŋˈɡwɪlə/ ang-GWIL-ə) is a British overseas territory in the Caribbean. It is one of the most northerly of the Leeward Islands in the Lesser Antilles, lying east of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands and directly north of Saint Martin. The territory consists of the main island of Anguilla itself, approximately 26 km (16 mi) long by 5 km (3.1 mi) wide at its widest point, together with a number of much smaller islands and cays with no permanent population. The island's capital is The Valley. The total land area of the territory is 91 km2 (35 sq mi), with a population of approximately 13,500 (2006 estimate).
Anguilla has become a popular tax haven, having no capital gains, estate, profit or other forms of direct taxation on either individuals or corporations.
Anguilla was first settled by Amerindian tribes who migrated from South America. The earliest Amerindian artifacts found on Anguilla have been dated to around 1300 BC, and remains of settlements date from 600 AD. The date of European discovery is uncertain: some sources claim that Columbus sighted the island in 1493, while others state that the island was first discovered by the French in 1564 or 1565. The name Anguilla derives from the word for "eel" in any of various Romance languages (modern Spanish: anguila; French: anguille; Italian: anguilla; Portuguese: enguia), probably chosen because of the island's eel-like shape.
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Apia
Apia is the capital and the largest city of Samoa. The city is located on the central north coast of Upolu, Samoa's second largest island. Apia is the only 'city' in Samoa and falls within the political district (itūmālō) of Tuamasaga.
The Apia Urban Area has a population of 37,708 (2006 Census) and is generally referred to as the City of Apia. The geographic boundaries of Apia Urban Area is mainly from Letogo village to the new industrialized region of Apia known as Vaitele.
Apia was originally a small village (1800 population is 304), from which the country's capital took its name. Apia village still exists within the larger modern capital of Apia which has grown into a sprawling urban area with many villages. Like every other settlement in the country, Apia village has its own matai chiefly leaders and fa'alupega (geneaology & customary greetings) according to fa'a Samoa.
The modern capital Apia was founded in the 1850s and has been the official capital of Samoa since 1959.
The harbor was also the site of an infamous 15 March 1889 naval standoff in which 7 ships from Germany, the US, and Britain refused to leave harbor while a typhoon was clearly approaching, lest the first moved would lose face. All the ships were sunk, except the British cruiser Calliope, which barely managed to leave port at 1 mile per hour and ride out the storm. Nearly 200 American and German lives were lost, as well as 6 ships sunk or beyond repair.
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Ascension Island
Ascension Island is an isolated volcanic island in the equatorial waters of the South Atlantic Ocean, around 1,600 kilometres (1,000 mi) from the coast of Africa and 2,250 kilometres (1,400 mi) from the coast of South America, which is roughly midway between the horn of South America and Africa. It is governed as part of the British Overseas Territory of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, of which the main island, Saint Helena, is around 1,300 kilometres (800 mi) to the southeast, and the territory also includes the "remotest populated archipelago" on earth, the sparsely populated Tristan da Cunha archipelago some thirty degrees farther south–about half the way to the Antarctic Circle.
The Island is named after the day of its recorded discovery, Ascension Day, and is located at 7°56′S 14°22′W / 7.933°S 14.367°W / -7.933; -14.367Coordinates: 7°56′S 14°22′W / 7.933°S 14.367°W / -7.933; -14.367, about as far south of the equator as tropical Venezuela is to its north. Historically, it has played a role as an important safe haven and coaling station to mariners and for commercial airliners during the days of international air travel by flying boats and during World War II was an important naval and air station, especially providing antisubmarine warfare bases in the Battle of the Atlantic and throughout the war. Ascension Island was garrisoned by the British Admiralty from 22 October 1815 to 1922.
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Atafu
Atafu, formerly known as the Duke of York Group is a group of 42 coral islets within Tokelau in the south Pacific Ocean, 500 km north of Samoa. Covering 2.5 km², it is the smallest of the three islands that constitute Tokelau, and is composed of an atoll surrounding a central lagoon, which itself covers some 15 km². The atoll lies some 800 kilometres south of the equator at 8° 35' South, 172° 30' West.
According to the 2006 census 524 people officially live on Atafu (however just 417 were present at census night). Of those present 95% belong to the Congregational Church. The main settlement on the atoll is located on Atafu Island at the northwestern corner of the atoll. The Presbyterian church was established on the island in 1858, but today almost all of the residents belong to the Congregational Christian Church. The first village on Atafu was established at the southern end of the islet, and residents built houses along the lagoon shore to receive the cooling trade winds.
The men on Atafu are highly skilled at fishing, and they use many traditional methods that are passed on from fathers to sons. They make highly effective lures, fish traps, nets, and seines, and noose fishing is still common. They also make well-crafted canoes, which are important vehicles for their fishing expeditions.
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Austral Islands
Coordinates: 23°0′S 150°0′W / 23°S 150°W / -23; -150
The Austral Islands (French: Îles Australes or Archipel des Australes) are the southernmost group of islands in French Polynesia, an overseas collectivity of France in the South Pacific. Geographically, they consist of two separate archipelagos, namely in the northwest the Tubuai Islands (French: Îles Tubuaï) consisting of the Îles Maria, Rimatara, Rurutu, Tubuai Island proper and Raivavae or Raevavae, and in the southeast the Bass Islands (French: Îles basses) composed of the main island of Rapa Iti and the small Marotiri. The islands of Maria and Marotiri are not suitable for sustained habitation. Several of the islands have uninhabited islets or rocks off their coastlines. Austral Islands' population is about 6,300 on almost 150 km2. The capital of the Austral Islands administrative subdivision is Tubuai.
The Austral Islands (French: Îles Australes or Archipel des Australes) are the southernmost group of islands in French Polynesia, an overseas collectivity of France in the South Pacific. Geographically, the Austral Islands consist of two separate archipelagos. From northwest to southeast they are:
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Australia
Australia ( /əˈstreɪljə/), officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent as well as the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area. Neighbouring countries include Indonesia, East Timor and Papua New Guinea to the north; the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and New Caledonia to the north-east; and New Zealand to the south-east.
For at least 40,000 years before European settlement in the late 18th century, Australia was inhabited by indigenous Australians, who belonged to one or more of roughly 250 language groups. After discovery by Dutch explorers in 1606, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain in 1770 and settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades; the continent was explored and an additional five self-governing Crown Colonies were established.
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Bengkulu
Bengkulu (also known as Southwest Sumatra) is a province of Indonesia. It is on the southwest coast of the island of Sumatra, and borders the provinces of West Sumatra, Jambi, South Sumatra and Lampung. The capital and largest city is Bengkulu city. It was formerly the site of a British garrison, which they called Bencoolen. The province also includes Enggano Island.
The province had a population of 1,455,500 at the 2000 census., rising to 875,663 males and 837,730 females recorded in the 2010 census
The English East India Company established a pepper-trading center and garrison at Bengkulu (Bencoolen) in 1685. In 1714 the British built Fort Marlborough in the city, which still stands. The trading post was never financially profitable for the British, hampered by a location which Europeans found unpleasant, and by an inability to find sufficient pepper to buy.
Despite these difficulties, the British persisted, maintaining their presence for 150 years before ceding it to the Dutch as part of the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1824 to focus attention on Malacca. Like the rest of Indonesia, Bengkulu remained a Dutch colony until after World War II.
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Bermuda
Bermuda ( /bɜrˈmjuːdə/), officially the Bermudas or Somers Islands, is a British overseas territory in the North Atlantic Ocean. Located off the east coast of the United States, its nearest landmass is Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, about 1,030 kilometres (640 mi) to the west-northwest. It is about 1,373 kilometres (853 mi) south of Halifax, Nova Scotia and 1,770 kilometres (1,100 mi) northeast of Miami, Florida, USA. Its capital city is Hamilton.
Bermuda was discovered in 1505 by Spanish sea captain Juan de Bermúdez, after whom the islands are named. Apparently uninhabited, he claimed them for the Spanish Empire. Although he paid two visits to the archipelago, Bermúdez was persuaded never to set foot on any of the islands by the dangerous reef surrounding them. Subsequent Spanish or other visitors are believed to have released the feral pigs that were abundant on the island when settlement began. In 1609, the Virginia Company, which had established Virginia and Jamestown on the American continent two years earlier, established a settlement on behalf of the English colonial empire. Initially, it was administered as an extension of Virginia by the Company until 1614, before its successor, the Somers Isles Company, took over until 1684. Bermuda then became a British colony following the 1707 unification of the Kingdom of England with the Kingdom of Scotland to create the unified Kingdom of Great Britain. After Newfoundland became part of Canada in 1949, Bermuda became the oldest (and, since the return of Hong Kong to China in 1997, the most populous) remaining British overseas territory. Its first capital, St George's, was established in 1612 and is the oldest continuously-inhabited English town in the Americas.
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Bonin Islands
The Bonin Islands, known in Japan as the Ogasawara Group (小笠原群島, Ogasawara Guntō?) are an archipelago of over 30 subtropical and tropical islands, some 1,000 kilometres (540 nmi; 620 mi) directly south of Tokyo, Japan. Administratively, they are part of Ogasawara Municipality (mura) of Ogasawara Subprefecture, Tokyo. The total area of the islands is 73 square kilometres (28 sq mi), with a population of 2,440 (2000 on Chichi-jima, and 440 on Haha-jima).
The Ogasawara Islands were added to UNESCO's list of World Natural Heritage sites in July 2011 as animals and plants there have undergone unique evolutionary processes since these islands have never been connected with a continent, thus often dubbed as the "Galapagos of the Orient".
The only inhabited islands of the group are Chichi-jima (父島), the seat of the municipal government, and Haha-jima (母島) includes what is within Ogasawara Village.
In Japanese, the archipelago is called Ogasawara Group (小笠原群島, Ogasawara Guntō?). By contrast, the term Ogasawara Archipelago (小笠原諸島, Ogasawara shotō?), is a wider, collective term for all islands of Ogasawara Municipality, which also includes the Volcano Islands and a few isolated islands. The common English name for Ogasawara Guntō is Bonin Islands, from bunin, an archaic reading of 無人 (mujin), that means "no people" or "uninhabited." Rich of unique forms of life, the archipelago was nominated as a natural World Heritage Site on June 24, 2011.
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British Ceylon
British Ceylon, known contemporaneously as Ceylon, was a British Crown colony between 1815 and 1948. The area it covered is now the island nation of Sri Lanka.
Before the beginning of the Dutch governance, the island of Ceylon was divided between the Portuguese Empire and the Kingdom of Kandy, who were in the midst of a war for control of the island as a whole. The island attracted the attention of the newly formed Batavian Republic when they were invited by the Sinhalese King to fight the Portuguese, and Dutch rule was soon imposed.
The Dutch, weakened by their wars against Great Britain, were eventually conquered by Napoleon and their leaders became refugees in London. No longer able to effectively govern the island the Dutch transferred the rule of Ceylon to the British against the will of the Dutch residing there.
As soon as Britain gained Ceylon from the Dutch they wanted to expand it by making the native (Kingdom of Kandy) a protectorate, an offer refused by the King of Kandy. Though the previous administration had not been powerful enough to threaten the reign of the Kandyan Kings, the British Empire was much more powerful. The refusal to become a protectorate lead to outright war between the two factions, which ended with the capitulation of the Kandyans in 1815.
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British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the largest empire in history and, for over a century, was the foremost global power. By 1922 the British Empire held sway over about 458 million people, one-fifth of the world's population at the time, and covered more than 33,700,000 km2 (13,012,000 sq mi), almost a quarter of the Earth's total land area. As a result, its political, linguistic and cultural legacy is widespread. At the peak of its power, it was often said that "the sun never sets on the British Empire" because its span across the globe ensured that the sun was always shining on at least one of its numerous territories.
During the Age of Discovery in the 15th and 16th centuries, Portugal and Spain pioneered European exploration of the globe, and in the process established large overseas empires. Envious of the great wealth these empires generated, England, France and the Netherlands began to establish colonies and trade networks of their own in the Americas and Asia. A series of wars in the 17th and 18th centuries with the Netherlands and France left England (and then, following union between England and Scotland in 1707, Great Britain) the dominant colonial power in North America and India. The loss of the Thirteen Colonies in North America in 1783 after a war of independence deprived Britain of some of its oldest and most populous colonies.
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British Guiana
British Guiana was the name of the British colony on the northern coast of South America, now the independent nation of Guyana.
The area was originally settled by the Dutch at the start of the 17th century as the colonies of Essequibo, Demerara, and Berbice. These three colonies were captured by the British in 1796; they were returned to the (Dutch) Batavian Republic in 1802, but were again captured by British forces a year later and were officially ceded to the United Kingdom in 1814, and consolidated into a single colony in 1831. The colony's capital was at Georgetown (known as Stabroek prior to 1812). Guyana went on to become independent of the United Kingdom on 26 May 1966.
There had been at least two unsuccessful attempts by the English to colonise the lands that would later be known as British Guiana during the 17th century, when the Dutch had established two colonies in the area: Essequibo, administered by the Dutch West India Company, and Berbice, administered by the Berbice Association. A third colony, Demerara, was established under the West India Company in the mid-18th century. Effective British control began in 1796 during the French Revolutionary Wars, at which time the Netherlands were under French occupation and Great Britain and France were at war. A British expeditionary force was dispatched from its colony of Barbados to seize the colonies from the French-dominated Batavian Republic. The colonies surrendered without a struggle, and initially very little changed, as the British agreed to allow the long-established laws of the colonies to remain in force.
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British Honduras
British Honduras was a British colony that is now the independent nation of Belize.
First colonised by Spaniards in the 17th century, the territory on the east coast of Central America, south of Mexico, became a British crown colony from 1862 until 1964, when it became self-governing. Belize became fully independent from the United Kingdom in 1981. Belize was the last continental possession of the United Kingdom in the Americas.
The Treaty of Versailles (1783) between Britain and Spain, gave the British rights to cut logwood between the Hondo and Belize rivers. In 1862, the Settlement of Belize in the Bay of Honduras was declared a British colony called British Honduras, and the crown's representative was elevated to a lieutenant governor, subordinate to the governor of Jamaica.
As the British consolidated their settlement and pushed deeper into the interior in search of mahogany in the late 18th century, they encountered resistance from the Maya. In the second half of the 19th century, however, a combination of events outside and inside the colony redefined the position of the Maya.
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British Hong Kong
British Hong Kong refers to Hong Kong as a Crown colony and later, a British dependent territory under British administration from 1841 to 1997.
In 1836, the Chinese government undertook a major policy review of the opium trade. Lin Zexu volunteered to take on the task of suppressing opium. In March 1839, he became Special Imperial Commissioner in Canton, where he ordered the foreign traders to surrender their opium stock. He confined the British to the Canton Factories and cut off their supplies. Chief Superintendent of Trade, Charles Elliot, complied with Lin's demands in order to secure a safe exit for the British, with the costs involved to be resolved between the two governments. When Elliot promised that the British government would pay for their opium stock, the merchants surrendered their 20,283 chests of opium, which were destroyed in public.
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British Somaliland
British Somaliland (Somali: Dhulka Biritishka ee Soomaaliya, Arabic: الصومال البريطاني Al-Sumal Al-Britaniy) was a British protectorate in the northern part of present-day Somalia. For much of its existence, British Somaliland was bordered by French Somaliland, Ethiopia, and Italian Somaliland. From 1940 to 1941, it was occupied by the Italians and was part of Italian East Africa. The protectorate briefly obtained independence on July 1, 1960 as the State of Somaliland before uniting as scheduled later the same week with the Trust Territory of Somalia (the former Italian Somaliland) to form the Somali Republic. The government of Somaliland, a self-declared sovereign state that is internationally recognised as an autonomous region of Somalia, regards the territory as the successor state to the State of Somaliland.
In 1888, after signing successive treaties with the then ruling Somali Sultans such as Mohamoud Ali Shire of the Warsangali Sultanate, the British established a protectorate in the region referred to as British Somaliland. The British garrisoned the protectorate from Aden and administered it from their British India colony until 1898. British Somaliland was then administered by the Foreign Office until 1905 and afterwards by the Colonial Office.
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Brunei
Brunei
i/bruːˈnaɪ/, officially the Nation of Brunei, the Abode of Peace (Malay: Negara Brunei Darussalam, Jawi: نڬارا بروني دارالسلام), is a sovereign state located on the north coast of the island of Borneo, in Southeast Asia. Apart from its coastline with the South China Sea, it is completely surrounded by the state of Sarawak, Malaysia, and it is separated into two parts by the Sarawak district of Limbang. It is the only sovereign state completely on the island of Borneo, with the remainder of the island belonging to Malaysia and Indonesia. Brunei's population was 401,890 in July 2011.
The official national history claims that Brunei can trace its beginnings to the 7th century, when it was a subject state of the Srivijayan empire under the name P'o-li. It later became a vassal state of Majapahit empire before converting to Islam in the 15th century. At the peak of its empire, the sultanate had control that extended over the coastal regions of modern-day Sarawak and Sabah, the Sulu archipelago, and the islands off the northwest tip of Borneo. The thalassocracy was visited by Ferdinand Magellan in 1521 and fought the Castille War in 1578 against Spain. Its empire began to decline with the forced ceding of Sarawak to James Brooke and the ceding of Sabah to the British North Borneo Chartered Company. After the loss of Limbang, Brunei finally became a British protectorate in 1888, receiving a resident in 1906. In the years after the Japanese wartime occupation during World War II, it formalised a constitution and fought an armed rebellion. Brunei regained its independence from the United Kingdom on 1 January 1984. Economic growth during the 1970s and 1990s, averaging 56% from 1999 to 2008, has transformed Brunei Darussalam into a newly industrialised country.
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Burma
Burma
i/ˈbɜrmə/ BUR-mə, also known as Myanmar i/ˌmjɑːnˈmɑr/ MYAHN--MAR, is a country in South Asia and Southeast Asia. It is bordered by India, Bangladesh, China, Laos and Thailand. One-third of Burma's total perimeter of 1,930 kilometres (1,200 mi) forms an uninterrupted coastline along the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea. At 676,578 km2 (261,227 sq mi), it is the 40th largest country in the world and the second largest country in Southeast Asia. Burma is also the 24th most populous country in the world with over 60.28 million people.
Burma is home to some of the early civilizations of Southeast Asia including the Pyu and the Mon. In the 9th century, the Burmans of the Kingdom of Nanzhao, entered the upper Irrawaddy valley and, following the establishment of the Pagan Empire in the 1050s, the Burmese language and culture slowly became dominant in the country. During this period, Theravada Buddhism gradually became the predominant religion of the country. The Pagan Empire fell due to the Mongol invasions (1277–1301), and several warring states emerged. In the second half of the 16th century, the country was reunified by the Taungoo Dynasty which for a brief period was the largest empire in the history of Southeast Asia. The early 19th century Konbaung Dynasty ruled over an area that included modern Burma as well as Manipur and Assam. The country was colonized by Britain following three Anglo-Burmese Wars (1824–1885).
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Cambodia
Cambodia (i/kæmˈboʊdiə/;Khmer: ព្រះរាជាណាចក្រកម្ពុជា, Kampuchea, IPA: [kɑmˈpuˈciə]), officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. With a total landmass of 181,035 square kilometres (69,898 sq mi), it is bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the northeast, Vietnam to the east, and the Gulf of Thailand to the southwest.
With a population of over 14.8 million, Cambodia is the 68th most populous country in the world. The official religion is Theravada Buddhism, which is practiced by around 95% of the Cambodian population. The country minority groups include Vietnamese, Chinese, Chams and 30 various hill tribes. The capital and largest city is Phnom Penh; the political, economic, and cultural center of Cambodia. The kingdom is a constitutional monarchy with Norodom Sihamoni, a monarch chosen by the Royal Throne Council, as head of state. The head of government is Hun Sen, who is currently the longest serving leader in South East Asia and has ruled Cambodia for over 25 years.
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Cayman Islands
The Cayman Islands ( /ˈkeɪmən/ or /keɪˈmæn/) is a British Overseas Territory located in the western Caribbean Sea. The territory comprises the three islands of Grand Cayman, Cayman Brac, and Little Cayman, located south of Cuba and northwest of Jamaica. The Cayman Islands are considered to be part of the geographic Western Caribbean Zone as well as the Greater Antilles. The territory is a major world offshore financial centre.
The Cayman Islands were first logged as sighted by Christopher Columbus on 10 May 1503 during his fourth and final voyage to the New World. He named the islands Las Tortugas after the large number of sea turtles observed there. The first recorded English visitor to the islands was Sir Francis Drake in 1586. He subsequently named the islands "Cayman" after caiman, a Neo-Taino word for "alligator".
The Cayman Islands remained largely uninhabited until the 17th century. While there is no archaeological evidence for an indigenous people on the islands, a variety of settlers from various backgrounds made their home on the islands, including pirates, refugees from the Spanish Inquisition, shipwrecked sailors, and deserters from Oliver Cromwell's army in Jamaica.
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Chile
Chile (i/ˈtʃɪliː/ or /ˈtʃɪleɪ/), officially the Republic of Chile (Spanish: República de Chile [reˈpuβlika ðe ˈtʃile] ( listen)), is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow strip of land between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far south. Along with Ecuador, it is one of two countries in South America that do not border Brazil. Chilean territory includes the Pacific islands of Juan Fernández, Salas y Gómez, Desventuradas and Easter Island. Chile also claims about 1,250,000 square kilometres (480,000 sq mi) of Antarctica, although all claims are suspended under the Antarctic Treaty.
Chile's distinctive shape—4,300 kilometres (2,700 mi) long and on average 175 kilometres (109 mi) wide—makes it the longest country in the world, north to south, with the fifth lengthiest coastline at over 78 thousand kilometers. The diverse climate of Chile ranges from the world's driest desert in the north—the Atacama—through a Mediterranean climate in the centre, humid subtropical in Easter Island, to an Oceanic climate, including alpine tundra and glaciers in the east and south. The northern desert contains great mineral wealth, principally copper. The relatively small central area dominates in terms of population and agricultural resources, and is the cultural and political center from which Chile expanded in the late 19th century when it incorporated its northern and southern regions. Southern Chile is rich in forests and grazing lands, and features a string of volcanoes and lakes. The southern coast is a labyrinth of fjords, inlets, canals, twisting peninsulas, and islands.
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Christmas Island
Coordinates: 10°29′S 105°38′E / 10.483°S 105.633°E / -10.483; 105.633 The Territory of Christmas Island is a territory of Australia in the Indian Ocean. It is 2,600 kilometres (1,600 mi) northwest of the Western Australian city of Perth, 360 km (220 mi) south of the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, 975 km (606 mi) ENE of the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and 2,748 km (1,708 mi) west of the Territorian city of Darwin.
Christmas Island has a population of 1,403 residents who live in a number of "settlement areas" on the northern tip of the island: Flying Fish Cove (also known as Kampong), Silver City, Poon Saan, and Drumsite.
The island’s geographic isolation and history of minimal human disturbance has led to a high level of endemism among its flora and fauna, which is of significant interest to scientists and naturalists. 63% of its 135 square kilometres (52 sq mi) is an Australian national park. There exist large areas of primary monsoonal forest.
Phosphate, deposited originally as dead marine organisms (not guano as often thought), has been mined on the island for many years.
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Colombia
Colombia (
/kəˈlʌmbiə/ kə-LUM-biə, or /kəˈlɒmbiə/ kə-LOM-biə), officially the Republic of Colombia (Spanish: República de Colombia [reˈpuβlika ðe koˈlombja]), is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the northwest by Panama; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; and to the west by the Pacific Ocean. Colombia has maritime borders with Ecuador, Panama, Venezuela, Jamaica, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica. Colombia is the 26th largest country by area and the fourth largest in South America after Brazil, Argentina and Peru. With over 46 million people, Colombia is the 27th largest country in the world by population and has the second largest population of any Spanish-speaking country in the world, after Mexico. Colombia is a middle power, with the fourth largest economy in Latin America, and the third largest in South America. Colombia is famous for the production of coffee, flowers, emeralds, coal, and oil. All of these products make up the primary sector of economy.
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Colonial Fiji
The United Kingdom declined its first opportunity to annex Fiji in 1852. Ratu Seru Epenisa Cakobau had offered to cede the islands, subject to being allowed to retain his Tui Viti (King of Fiji) title, a condition unacceptable to both the British and to many of his fellow chiefs, who regarded him only as first among equals, if that. Mounting debts and threats from the United States Navy had led Cakobau to establish a constitutional monarchy with a government dominated by European settlers in 1871, following an agreement with the Australian Polynesia Company to pay his debts. The collapse of the new regime drove him to make another offer of cession in 1872, which the British accepted. On 10 October 1874, 96 years of British rule began in Fiji.
Sir Hercules Robinson, who had arrived on 23 September 1874, was appointed as interim Governor. He was replaced in June 1875 by Sir Arthur Gordon. Rather than establish direct rule in all spheres, Gordon granted autonomy over local affairs to Fiji's chiefs, though they were now forbidden to engage in tribal warfare. The colony was divided into four regions, each under the control of a Roko; these regions were further subdivided into twelve districts, each ruled by a traditional chief. A Great Council of Chiefs was established in 1876 to advise the Governor. This body continues in existence to this day and has a constitutional role as an electoral collage that chooses Fiji's President, Vice-President, and 14 of the 32 Senators. The Great Council was supplemented by a Native Regulation Board (now the Fijian Affairs Board); these two bodies together made laws for the Fijians. (European settlers, however, were not subject to its laws). In 1882, the capital was moved from Levuka to the more accessible Suva.
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Cook Islands
The Cook Islands (i/ˈkʊk ˈaɪləndz/; Cook Islands Māori: Kūki 'Āirani) is a self-governing parliamentary democracy in the South Pacific Ocean in free association with New Zealand. The 15 small islands have a total land area of 240 square kilometres (92.7 sq mi), but the Cook Islands Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) covers 1,800,000 square kilometres (690,000 sq mi) of ocean.
The main population centres are on the island of Rarotonga (14,153 in 2006), where there is an international airport. There is a much larger population of Cook Islanders in New Zealand, particularly the North Island. In the 2006 census, 58,008 self-identified as being of ethnic Cook Island Māori descent.
With about 100,000 visitors travelling to the islands in the 2010-11 financial year,tourism is the country's main industry, and the leading element of the economy, far ahead of offshore banking, pearls, and marine and fruit exports.
Defence and foreign affairs are the responsibility of New Zealand, in consultation with the Cook Islands. In recent times, the Cook Islands have adopted an increasingly independent foreign policy. Although Cook Islanders are citizens of New Zealand, they have the status of Cook Islands nationals, which is not given to other New Zealand citizens.
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Coral Sea Islands
The Coral Sea Islands Territory includes a group of small and mostly uninhabited tropical islands and reefs in the Coral Sea, northeast of Queensland, Australia. The only inhabited island is Willis Island. The territory covers 780,000 km2, extending east and south from the outer edge of the Great Barrier Reef, and including Heralds Beacon Island, Osprey Reef, the Willis Group, and fifteen other reef/island groups.
The Coral Sea Islands were first charted in 1803; in the 1870 and 1880s the islands were mined for guano but the absence of a permanent supply of fresh water prevented long-term habitation. The territory was created in 1969 by the Coral Sea Islands Act (before, the area was considered part of Queensland) and extended in 1997 to include Elizabeth and Middleton Reefs nearly 800 km further South, already in the Tasman Sea.
The two latter reefs are much closer to Lord Howe Island, New South Wales (about 150 km) than to the southernmost island of the rest of the territory, Cato Island. The islands, cays and reefs of the Great Barrier Reef are not part of the territory, belonging to Queensland instead. The outer edge of the Great Barrier Reef is the boundary between Queensland and the Coral Sea Islands Territory.
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Cyprus
Cyprusi/ˈsaɪprəs/ (Greek: Κύπρος, Kýpros, IPA: [ˈcipɾos]; Turkish: Kıbrıs, IPA: [ˈkɯbɾɯs]), officially the Republic of Cyprus (Greek: Κυπριακή Δημοκρατία, Kypriakī́ Dīmokratía, IPA: [cipɾiaˈci ðimokɾaˈtia]; Turkish: Kıbrıs Cumhuriyeti, IPA: [ˈkɯbɾɯs dʒumhuɾijeˈti]), is an island country in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria, Lebanon, northwest of Israel and north of Egypt. Cyprus is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea and the Republic of Cyprus is a member state of the European Union.
The earliest known human activity on the island dates back to around the 10th millennium BC. Archaeological remains from this period include the well-preserved Neolithic village of Khirokitia, which has been declared a World Heritage Site with an "enhanced protection" status in the event of armed conflict by UNESCO, along with the archaeological sites of Paphos and the Painted Churches of the Troodos Region. Cyprus is home to some of the oldest water wells in the world.
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Delhi
Delhi (/ˈdɛli/; locally pronounced Dillee or Dehli), officially the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT), is the largest metropolis by area and the second-largest metropolis by population in India. It is the eighth largest metropolis in the world by population with 16.7 million inhabitants in the Territory at the 2011 Census. The region has been given special status of National Capital Region under The Constitution (69th Amendment) Act, 1991. There are nearly 22.2 million residents in the greater National Capital Region urban area (which also includes the cities Noida, Greater Noida, Ghaziabad, Gurgaon,Sonepat and Faridabad along with other smaller nearby towns).
Delhi is known to have been continuously inhabited since at least the 6th century BCE, though human habitation is believed to have existed since the second millennium BCE. Delhi is also widely believed to have been the site of Indraprastha, the legendary capital of the Pandavas during the times of the Mahabharata. Delhi re-emerged as a major political, cultural and commercial city along the trade routes between northwest India and the Gangetic plain after the rise of the Delhi sultanates. It is the site of many ancient and medieval monuments, archaeological sites and remains.
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East Timor
The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste (tiˈmɔr ˈlɛʃteɪ), commonly known as East Timori/ˌiːst ˈtiːmɔr/ (Tetum: Timór Lorosa'e, Portuguese: Timor-Leste), is a sovereign state in Southeast Asia. It comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor, the nearby islands of Atauro and Jaco, and Oecusse, an exclave on the northwestern side of the island, within Indonesian West Timor. The small country of 15,410 km² (5,400 sq mi) is located about 640 km (400 mi) northwest of Darwin, Australia.
East Timor was colonized by Portugal in the 16th century, and was known as Portuguese Timor until Portugal's decolonization of the country. In late 1975, East Timor declared its independence, but later that year was invaded and occupied by Indonesia and was declared Indonesia's 27th province the following year. In 1999, following the United Nations-sponsored act of self-determination, Indonesia relinquished control of the territory and East Timor became the first new sovereign state of the 21st century on May 20, 2002. East Timor is one of only two predominantly Roman Catholic countries in Asia, the other being the Philippines.
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Easter Island
Coordinates: 27°7′S 109°22′W / 27.117°S 109.367°W / -27.117; -109.367
Easter Island (Rapa Nui: Rapa Nui, Spanish: Isla de Pascua) is a Polynesian island in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, at the southeasternmost point of the Polynesian Triangle. A special territory of Chile that was annexed in 1888, Easter Island is famous for its 887 extant monumental statues, called moai, created by the early Rapanui people. It is a World Heritage Site (as determined by UNESCO) with much of the island protected within Rapa Nui National Park. In recent times the island has served as a warning of the cultural and environmental dangers of overexploitation. Ethnographers and archaeologists also blame diseases carried by European colonizers and slave raiding of the 1860s for devastating the local peoples.
Easter Island is claimed to be the most remote inhabited island in the world.
The name "Easter Island" was given by the island's first recorded European visitor, the Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen, who encountered it on Easter Sunday 1722, while searching for Davis or David's island. Roggeveen named it Paasch-Eyland (18th century Dutch for "Easter Island"). The island's official Spanish name, Isla de Pascua, also means "Easter Island".
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Fakaofo
Fakaofo, formerly known as Bowditch Island, is a South Pacific Ocean atoll located at 171° 15' West, 9° 25' South in the Tokelau Group. The actual land area is only about 3 km², consisting of islets on a coral reef surrounding a central lagoon of some 45 km². According to the 2006 census 483 people officially live on Fakaofo (however just 370 were present at census night). Of those present 70% belong to the Congregational Church and 22% to the Catholic Church.
The main settlement on the island is Fale on Fale Islet, towards the western side of the atoll. Located two kilometres to the west of it is the relatively large Fenua Fala Islet, where a second settlement had been established in 1960. Other islets in the group include Teafua, Nukumatau, Nukulakia, Fenua Loa, Saumatafanga, Motu Akea, Matangi, Lalo, and Mulifenua.
Fakaofo's Council of Elders is made up of citizens over the age of 60.
Previously known as Bowditch after its discoverer, this island was visited by the American ship Peacock which was part of the first American voyage of discovery~ The United States Navy Exploring Expedition, or simply the Ex Ex, 1838–1842, Charles Wikes Commanding. Nathaniel Bowditch(1773–1838) was a noted American navigator who wrote a famous two volume epitome of Navigation that is still used and published today by the Defense Mapping Agency/Topography Center; U.S Printing Office, Washington, D.C. This Epitome is an encyclopedic work on everything to do with Navigation and Sailing. The author of a first hand account entitled Twenty Years Before The Mast, one Charles Erskine, wrote that "The people found on this island had no knowledge of fire, which I believe, is the only instance of the kind on record." Twenty Years Before The Mast, George W. Jacobs & Co, Philadelphia, 1896. This book should not be confused with another book with a similar title by Richard Henry Dana, Jr. which tells about hide trading on the California coast in the early 19th century.
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Falkland Islands
The Falkland Islands (English pronunciation: /ˈfɒlklənd/ or English pronunciation: /ˈfɔːlklənd/; Spanish: Islas Malvinas) are an archipelago in the South Atlantic Ocean, located more than 250 nautical miles (460 km; 290 mi) east of the coast of mainland South America. The archipelago comprises East Falkland, West Falkland, and 776 lesser islands. Stanley, the capital and only city, is on East Falkland. The islands are a self-governing British Overseas Territory, with the United Kingdom responsible for their defence and foreign affairs.
Controversy exists over the Falklands' original discovery and subsequent colonisation by Europeans. At various times there have been French, British, Spanish, and Argentine settlements. Britain re-established its rule in 1833, yet the islands continue to be claimed by Argentina. In 1982, following Argentina's invasion of the islands, the two-month-long undeclared Falklands War between both countries resulted in the withdrawal of all Argentine forces. Despite its defeat, Argentina still pursues its claim; however, UK policy supports the islanders' self-determination to remain British citizens.
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Federation of Malaya
The Federation of Malaya (Malay: Persekutuan Tanah Melayu; Jawi: ڤرسكوتوان تانه ملايو) is the name given to a federation of 11 states (nine Malay states and two of the British Straits Settlements, Penang and Malacca) that existed from 31 January 1948 until 16 September 1963. The Federation became independent on 31 August 1957. It was reconstituted as Malaysia with the addition in 1963 of Singapore, Sabah, and Sarawak.
From 1946 to 1948, the 11 states formed a single British crown colony known as the Malayan Union. Due to opposition from Malay nationalists, the Union was disbanded and replaced by the Federation of Malaya, which restored the symbolic positions of the rulers of the Malay states.
Within the Federation, while the Malay states were protectorates of the United Kingdom, Penang and Malacca remained British colonial territories. Like the Malayan Union before it, the Federation did not include Singapore, despite its traditional connections with Malaya.
The Federation achieved independence within the Commonwealth of Nations on 31 August 1957. In 1963, the Federation was reconstitued as "Malaysia" when it federated with the British territories of Singapore, Sarawak, and British North Borneo (renamed Sabah); the latter territory was claimed to be a part of the Sultanate of Sulu. Singapore separated from Malaysia to become an independent republic on 9 August 1965.
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Fiji
Fijii/ˈfiːdʒiː/ (Fijian: Viti; Fiji Hindi: फ़िजी), officially the Republic of Fiji (Fijian: Matanitu ko Viti; Fiji Hindi: फ़िजी गणराज्यFijī Gaṇarājya), is an island nation in Melanesia in the South Pacific Ocean about 1,100 nautical miles (2,000 km; 1,300 mi) northeast of New Zealand's North Island. Its closest neighbours are Vanuatu to the west, France's New Caledonia to the southwest, New Zealand's Kermadec to the southeast, Tonga to the east, the Samoas, France's Wallis and Futuna to the northeast and Tuvalu to the north.
The majority of Fiji's islands were formed through volcanic activity started around 150 million years ago. Today, some geothermal activity still occurs on the islands of Vanua Levu and Taveuni. Fiji has been inhabited since the second millennium BC. The country comprises an archipelago of more than 332 islands, of which 110 are permanently inhabited, and more than 500 islets, amounting to a total land area of circa 18,300 square kilometres (7,100 sq mi). The two major islands, Viti Levu and Vanua Levu, account for 87% of the population of almost 850,000. The former contains Suva, the capital and largest city. Most of Fijians live on Viti Levu's coasts, either in Suva or in smaller urban centres. Viti Levu's interior is sparsely inhabited due to its terrain.
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France
France (Englishi/ˈfræns/ FRANSS or /ˈfrɑːns/ FRAHNSS; French: [fʁɑ̃s] ( listen)), officially the French Republic (French: République française [ʁepyblik fʁɑ̃sɛz]), is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean. It is often referred to as l’Hexagone ("The Hexagon") because of the geometric shape of its territory. It is the largest western European country and it possesses the second-largest exclusive economic zone in the world, covering 11,035,000 km2 (4,260,000 sq mi), just behind that of the United States (11,351,000 km2 / 4,383,000 sq mi).
Over the past 500 years, France has been a major power with strong cultural, economic, military and political influence in Europe and around the world. During the 17th and 18th centuries, France colonised great parts of North America and Southeast Asia; during the 19th and early 20th centuries, France built the second largest colonial empire of the time, including large portions of North, West and Central Africa, Southeast Asia, and many Caribbean and Pacific Islands.
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French Polynesia
French Polynesia (i/ˈfrɛntʃ pɒlɨˈniːʒə/; French: Polynésie française, pronounced: [pɔlinezi fʁɑ̃sɛz]; Tahitian: Pōrīnetia Farāni) is an overseas country of the French Republic (pays d'outre-mer). It is made up of several groups of Polynesian islands, the most famous island being Tahiti in the Society Islands group, which is also the most populous island and the seat of the capital of the territory (Papeetē). Although not an integral part of its territory, Clipperton Island was administered from French Polynesia until 2007.
The island groups that make up French Polynesia were not officially united until the establishment of the French protectorate in 1889. The first of these islands to be settled by indigenous Polynesians were the Marquesas Islands in AD 300 and the Society Islands in AD 800. The Polynesians were organized in loose chieftainships.
European communication began in 1521 when the Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan sighted Pukapuka in the Tuāmotu-Gambier Archipelago. Dutchman Jakob Roggeveen came across Bora Bora in the Society Islands in 1722, and the British explorer Samuel Wallis visited Tahiti in 1767. The French explorer Louis Antoine de Bougainville visited Tahiti in 1768, while the British explorer James Cook visited in 1769. Christian missions began with Spanish priests who stayed in Tahiti for a year from 1774; Protestants from the London Missionary Society settled permanently in Polynesia in 1797.
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Gambier Islands
The Gambier Islands or Mangareva Islands (French: Îles Gambier or Archipel des Gambier) are a small group of islands in French Polynesia, located at the southeast terminus of the Tuamotu archipelago. They are generally considered a separate island group from Tuamotu both because their culture and language (Mangarevan) are much more closely related to those of the Marquesas Islands, and because, while the Tuamotus comprise several chains of coral atolls, the Gambiers are of volcanic origin. Because of their proximity, the Acteon Group, and the nearby atoll of Temoe (23°20′46″S 134°28′28″W / 23.34611°S 134.47444°W / -23.34611; -134.47444) are sometimes included among the Gambiers.
The commune of Gambier is made up of the Gambier Islands (with uninhabited Temoe Atoll 40 km east of the main Gambier group), the uninhabited Acteon Group to the west (Matureivavao, Tenararo, Tenarunga, Vahanga), and the atolls of Marutea Sud, Maria Est and Morane. This group of islands and atolls covers an area of 35 km².
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Gibraltar
Gibraltar ( /dʒɨˈbrɒltər/) is a British overseas territory located on the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula at the entrance of the Mediterranean. It has an area of 6.8 square kilometres (2.6 sq mi) and a northern border with Andalusia, Spain. The Rock of Gibraltar is the major landmark of the region. At its foot is the densely populated city area, home to almost 30,000 Gibraltarians and other nationalities.
An Anglo-Dutch force captured Gibraltar from Spain in 1704 during the War of the Spanish Succession. The territory was subsequently ceded to Britain "in perpetuity" under the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. It was an important base for the Royal Navy; today its economy is based largely on tourism, financial services, and shipping.
The sovereignty of Gibraltar is a major point of contention in Anglo-Spanish relations as Spain asserts a claim to the territory. Gibraltarians rejected proposals for Spanish sovereignty in a 1967 referendum and again in 2002. Under the Gibraltar constitution of 2006, Gibraltar governs its own affairs, though some powers, such as defence and foreign relations, remain the responsibility of the UK Government.
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Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain (Welsh: Prydain Fawr, Scottish Gaelic: Breatainn Mhòr, Cornish: Breten Veur) is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, the largest European island, and the largest of the British Isles. With a population of about 60.0 million people in mid-2009, it is the third most populous island in the world, after Java and Honshū. Great Britain is surrounded by over 1,000 smaller islands and islets. The island of Ireland lies to its west. Politically, Great Britain may also refer to the island itself together with a number of surrounding islands which comprise the territory of England, Scotland and Wales.
All of the island is territory of the sovereign state of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and most of the United Kingdom's territory is in Great Britain. Most of England, Scotland, and Wales are on the island of Great Britain, as are their respective capital cities: London, Edinburgh, and Cardiff.
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Guam
Guam (i/ˈɡwɑːm/; Chamorro: Guåhån) is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States located in the western Pacific Ocean. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. Guam is listed as one of sixteen Non-Self-Governing Territories by the Special Committee on Decolonization of the United Nations. The island's capital is Hagåtña (formerly Agaña). Guam is the largest and southernmost of the Mariana Islands.
The Chamorros, Guam's indigenous people, first populated the island approximately 4,000 years ago. The island has a long history of European colonialism. Discovered by Ferdinand Magellan during a Spanish expedition on March 6, 1521, the first colony was established in 1668 by Spain with the arrival of settlers including Padre San Vitores, a Catholic missionary. For more than two centuries Guam was an important stopover for the Spanish Manila Galleons that crossed the Pacific annually. The island was controlled by Spain until 1898, when it was surrendered to the United States during the Spanish-American War and later formally ceded as part of the Treaty of Paris.
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Hainan
Coordinates: 19°12′N 109°42′E / 19.2°N 109.7°E / 19.2; 109.7
Hainan (Chinese: 海南; Mandarin Pinyin: Hǎinán (help·info); Jyutping: Hoi² Naam4; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Hái-lâm; literally "South of the Sea [Qiongzhou Strait]") is the smallest province of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The name "Hainan" also refers to Hainan Island (海南岛, Hǎinán Dǎo), the main island of the province. Hainan is located in the South China Sea, separated from Guangdong's Leizhou Peninsula to the north by the shallow and narrow Qiongzhou Strait.
For centuries Hainan Island was part of Guangdong Province, but in 1988 this resource-rich tropical island became part of the newly created Hainan Province (海南省, Hǎinán Shěng).
The province has an area of 33,920 square kilometres (13,100 sq mi) and is China's southernmost province. Although it comprises some two hundred islands scattered among three archipelagos off the southern coast, 32,900 square kilometres (12,700 sq mi) (97%) of its land mass is Hainan Island, from which the province takes its name. The PRC government claims territories of the province extend to the southern Spratly Islands, Paracel Islands, and other disputed marine territory.
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Hawaii
Coordinates: 21°18′41″N 157°47′47″W / 21.31139°N 157.79639°W / 21.31139; -157.79639
Hawaii (i/həˈwaɪ.iː/ or /həˈwaɪʔiː/; Hawaiian: Hawaiʻi Hawaiian pronunciation: [hɐˈvɐiʔi]) is the most recent of the 50 U.S. states (August 21, 1959), and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean.
Hawaii’s diverse natural scenery, warm tropical climate, abundance of public beaches and oceanic surrounding, and active volcanoes make it a popular destination for tourists, surfers, biologists, and volcanologists alike. Due to its mid-Pacific location, Hawaii has many North American and Asian influences along with its own vibrant native culture. Hawaii has over a million permanent residents along with many visitors and U.S. military personnel. Its capital is Honolulu on the island of Oʻahu.
The state encompasses nearly the entire volcanic Hawaiian Island chain, which comprises hundreds of islands spread over 1,500 miles (2,400 km). At the southeastern end of the archipelago, the eight "main islands" are (from the northwest to southeast) Niʻihau, Kauaʻi, Oʻahu, Molokaʻi, Lānaʻi, Kahoʻolawe, Maui, and the island of Hawaiʻi. The last is by far the largest and is often called "The Big Island" to avoid confusion with the state as a whole. The archipelago is physiographically and ethnologically part of the Polynesian subregion of Oceania.
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History of Australia
The History of Australia refers to the history of the area and people of the Commonwealth of Australia and its preceding Indigenous and colonial societies. Aboriginal Australians are believed to have first arrived on the Australian mainland by boat from the Indonesian archipelago between 40,000 to 60,000 years ago. They established among the longest surviving artistic, musical and spiritual traditions known on Earth.
The first uncontested landing in Australia by Europeans was by Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon in 1606. Other European explorers followed intermittently until, in 1770, James Cook charted the East Coast of Australia for Britain and returned with accounts favouring colonisation at Botany Bay (now in Sydney), New South Wales. A First Fleet of British ships arrived at Botany Bay in January 1788 to establish a penal colony. Other colonies were established by Britain around the continent and European explorers went deep into the interior throughout the 19th century. Introduced disease and conflict with the British colonists greatly weakened Indigenous Australians throughout the period.
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Indonesia
Indonesia (i/ˌɪndəˈniːʒə/ IN-də-NEE-zhə or /ˌɪndoʊˈniːziə/ IN-doh-NEE-zee-ə), officially the Republic of Indonesia (Indonesian: Republik Indonesia Indonesian pronunciation: [rɛpʊblɪk ɪndɔnɛsɪa]), is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 17,508 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an elected legislature and president. The nation's capital city is Jakarta. The country shares land borders with Papua New Guinea, East Timor, and Malaysia. Other neighboring countries include Singapore, Philippines, Australia, and the Indian territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Indonesia is a founding member of ASEAN and a member of the G-20 major economies. The Indonesian economy is the world's 17th largest economy by nominal GDP.
The Indonesian archipelago has been an important trade region since at least the 7th century, when Srivijaya and then later Majapahit traded with China and India. Local rulers gradually absorbed foreign cultural, religious and political models from the early centuries CE, and Hindu and Buddhist kingdoms flourished. Indonesian history has been influenced by foreign powers drawn to its natural resources. Muslim traders brought Islam, and European powers brought Christianity and fought one another to monopolize trade in the Spice Islands of Maluku during the Age of Discovery. Following three and a half centuries of Dutch colonialism, Indonesia secured its independence after World War II. Indonesia's history has since been turbulent, with challenges posed by natural disasters, corruption, separatism, a democratization process, and periods of rapid economic change.
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Irish Free State
The Irish Free State (Irish: Saorstát Éireann) (6 December 1922–1937) was the state established as a dominion under the Anglo-Irish Treaty, signed by the British government and Irish representatives exactly twelve months beforehand. On the day the Irish Free State was established, it comprised the entire island of Ireland, but Northern Ireland almost immediately exercised its right under the treaty to remove itself from the new state. The Irish Free State effectively replaced both the self-proclaimed Irish Republic (founded 21 January 1919) and the Provisional Government of Southern Ireland. W. T. Cosgrave, the first President of the Irish Free State had led both of these "governments" since August 1922.
The Irish Free State came to an end in 1937, when the citizens voted by referendum to replace the 1922 constitution. It was succeeded by the sovereign, modern state of the Republic of Ireland.
The Easter Rising of 1916, and in particular the decision of the British military authorities to execute many of its leaders after courts martial, generated sympathy for the republican cause in Ireland. Republicans and some independent Nationalists who led opposition to the idea of compulsory military service for Irish men in the conscription crisis of early 1918. The Irish Parliamentary Party, who supported the Allied cause in World War I in response to the passing of the Third Home Rule Bill in 1914 was discredited by the crisis. In the December 1918 general election, a large majority of Irish seats in the Westminster parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland were won by Sinn Féin, with 73 of 105 constituencies returning Sinn Féin members. Sinn Féin was a previously non-violent separatist party founded by Arthur Griffith in 1905. Under Éamon de Valera's leadership from 1917, it had campaigned aggressively for an Irish republic.
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Isla Salas y Gómez
Isla Salas y Gómez, also known as Isla Sala y Gómez, is a small uninhabited Chilean island in the Pacific Ocean. It is the easternmost point in the Polynesian Triangle. Administratively, it is part of the Easter Island Commune in the Easter Island Province of the Valparaíso Region.
Isla Salas y Gómez and its surrounding waters are a Marine Protected Area called Parque Marino Sala y Gómez, with a surface area of 150.000 km2.
Isla Salas y Gómez is located 3,210 km west of the Chilean mainland, 2,490 km west of Chile's Desventuradas Islands, and 390 km east-northeast of Easter Island, the closest landmass. Salas y Gómez consists of two rocks, a smaller one in the west measuring 4 hectare in area (270 meters north-south, 200 meters east-west), and a larger one in the east measuring 11 ha (500 meters north-south, 270 meters east-west), which are connected by a narrow isthmus in the north, averaging approximately 30 meters in width. The total area is approximately 15 hectares (0.15 km²), and the total length northwest-southeast is 770 meters. Its highest point, 30 meters above sea level, is in the south of the eastern rock, less than 30 meters from the shore, above a 10 meter high cliff. The highest elevation on the western rock is 26 meters.
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Japan
Japani/dʒəˈpæn/ (Japanese: 日本 Nihon or Nippon; formally 日本国 Nippon-koku or Nihon-koku, literally the State of Japan) is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south. The characters that make up Japan's name mean "sun-origin", which is why Japan is sometimes referred to as the "Land of the Rising Sun".
Japan is an archipelago of 6,852 islands. The four largest islands are Honshū, Hokkaidō, Kyūshū and Shikoku, together accounting for ninety-seven percent of Japan's land area. Japan has the world's tenth-largest population, with over 127 million people. The Greater Tokyo Area, which includes the de facto capital city of Tokyo and several surrounding prefectures, is the largest metropolitan area in the world, with over 30 million residents.
Archaeological research indicates that people lived in Japan as early as the Upper Paleolithic period. The first written mention of Japan is in Chinese history texts from the 1st century AD. Influence from other nations followed by long periods of isolation has characterized Japan's history. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, victory in the First Sino-Japanese War, the Russo-Japanese War and World War I allowed Japan to expand its empire during a period of increasing militarism. The Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937 expanded into part of World War II in 1941, which came to an end in 1945 following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Since adopting its revised constitution in 1947, Japan has maintained a unitary constitutional monarchy with an emperor and an elected parliament called the Diet.
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Kapingamarangi
Coordinates: 1°4′N 154°47′E / 1.067°N 154.783°E / 1.067; 154.783
Kapingamarangi is an atoll and a municipality in the state of Pohnpei of the Federated States of Micronesia. It is by far the most southerly atoll or island of the country and of the Caroline Islands, 300 km south of the next southerly atoll, Nukuoro, and 740 km southwest of the main island of Pohnpei state.
The total area of the atoll, including the lagoon, is 74 km². Out of this, 1.1 km² is land area, spread over 33 wooded islets on the eastern side of the atoll. The western reef rim of the atoll is almost submerged at high water.
Kapingamarangi has a population of about 500 (as of 2007). Several hundred Kapingamarangi people also live in Porakied village in Pohnpei. Their language is Polynesian. The main industry is fishing. Touhou Island, which reaches a height 35 inches and is connected to Veilua Island (Ueru Island) in the north by a causeway, is the capital of the municipality, the center of population and the home of a native chief. Most of the population resides on these two islets, plus on Taringa (south of Touhou), although many of the remaining islets are used for growing fruit and vegetables.
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Kiribati
Kiribati ([kɪribas] KIRR-i-bas or ˌkɪrəˈbɑdi;Gilbertese: [ˈkiɾibas]), officially the Republic of Kiribati, is an island nation located in the central tropical Pacific Ocean. The permanent population is just over 100,000 (2011), and the island nation is composed of 32 atolls and one raised coral island, dispersed over 3.5 million square kilometres, (1,351,000 square miles) straddling the equator, and bordering the International Date Line at its easternmost point.
The name Kiribati is the local pronunciation of "Gilberts", derived from the main island chain, the Gilbert Islands. The capital of South Tarawa consists of a number of islets connected through a series of causeways, located in the Tarawa archipelago. Kiribati became independent from the United Kingdom in 1979. It is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, the IMF and the World Bank, and became a full member of the United Nations in 1999.
Kiribati was named in French by captains Krusenstern and Louis Isidore Duperrey "îles Gilbert", Gilbert Islands, after the British Captain Thomas Gilbert, who sighted the islands in 1788. The current name, Kiribati, is an adaptation of "Gilberts", from the former European name the "Gilbert Islands". Although the indigenous Gilbertese language name for the Gilbert Islands proper is Tungaru, the new state chose the name "Kiribati", the Gilbertese rendition of "Gilberts", as an equivalent of the former colony to acknowledge the inclusion of islands which were never considered part of the Gilberts chain.
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Lau Islands
The Lau Islands (also called the Lau Group, the Eastern Group, the Eastern Archipelago) of Fiji are situated in the southern Pacific Ocean, just east of the Koro Sea. Of this chain of about one hundred islands and islets, about thirty are inhabited. The Lau Group covers a land area of 188 square miles (487 square km), and had a population of 10,683 at the most recent census in 2007. While most of the northern Lau Group are high islands of volcanic origin, those of the south are mostly carbonate low islands.
Administratively the islands belong to Lau Province.
The British explorer James Cook reached Vatoa in 1774. By the time of the discovery of the Ono Group in 1820, the Lau archipelago was the most mapped area of Fiji.
Political unity came late to the Lau Islands. Historically, they comprised three territories: the Northern Lau Islands, the Southern Lau Islands, and the Moala Islands. Around 1855, the renegade Tongan prince Enele Ma'afu conquered the region and established a unified administration. Calling himself the Tui Lau, or King of Lau, he promulgated a constitution and encouraged the establishment of Christian missions. The first missionaries had arrived at Lakeba in 1830, but had been expelled. The Tui Nayau, who had been the nominal overlord of the Lau Islands, became subject to Ma'afu.
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Line Islands
Coordinates: 0°0′S 157°0′W / 0°N 157°W / 0; -157
The Line Islands, Teraina Islands or Equatorial Islands, is a chain of eleven atolls and low coral islands in the central Pacific Ocean, south of the Hawaiian Islands, that stretches for 2,350 km in a northwest-southeast direction, making it one of the longest islands chains of the world. Eight of the islands form part of Kiribati, while the remaining three are United States territories grouped with the United States Minor Outlying Islands.
Those that are part of Kiribati are in the world's farthest forward time zone, UTC+14:00. The time of day is the same as in Hawaiʻi, but the date is one day ahead. The time is 26 hours ahead of some other islands in Oceania like Baker Island which uses UTC-12:00.
The United States previously claimed all the Line Islands under the Guano Islands Act. This claim was relinquished under the Treaty of Tarawa, which recognised Kiribati's sovereignty over the majority of the chain.
The group is geographically divided into three subgroups; The Northern, Central, and Southern Line Islands. The Central Line Islands are sometimes grouped with the Southern Line Islands. The table below lists the islands from North to South.
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Madagascar
Madagascar, officially the Republic of Madagascar (older name Malagasy Republic, Malagasy: Repoblikan'i Madagasikara [republiˈkʲan madaɡasˈkʲarə̥], French: République de Madagascar) is an island country located in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern coast of Africa. The nation comprises the island of Madagascar (the fourth-largest island in the world), as well as numerous smaller peripheral islands. Following the prehistoric breakup of the supercontinent Gondwana, Madagascar split from India around 88 million years ago, allowing plants and animals on the island to evolve in complete isolation. Consequently, Madagascar is a biodiversity hotspot in which over 90% of its wildlife is found nowhere else on Earth. The island's diverse ecosystems and unique wildlife are threatened by human settlement.
Initial human settlement of Madagascar occurred from 350 BCE and 550 CE by Austronesian peoples arriving on outrigger canoes from Borneo who were later joined around 1000 CE by Bantu migrants crossing the Mozambique Channel. Other groups continued to settle on Madagascar over time, each one making lasting contributions to Malagasy cultural life. The Malagasy ethnic group is often divided into eighteen or more sub-groups of which the largest are the Merina of the central highlands.
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Malayan Union
The Malayan Union was a federation of the Malay states and the Straits Settlements of Penang and Malacca. It was the successor to British Malaya and was conceived to unify the Malay Peninsula under a single government so as to simplify administration. The Malayan Union later became the independent Federation of Malaya in 1948. The Federation of Malaya became the Federation of Malaysia in 1963, following the admission of Singapore, Sabah (North Borneo) and Sarawak to the new federation. Singapore left the federation and became independent in 1965.
On April 1, 1946, the Malayan Union officially came into existence with Sir Edward Gent as its governor. The capital of the Union was Kuala Lumpur.
The idea of the Union was first expressed by the British on October 1945 (plans had been presented to the War Cabinet as early as May 1944) in the aftermath of the Second World War by the British Military Administration. Sir Harold MacMichael was assigned the task of gathering the Malay state rulers' approval for the Malayan Union in the same month. In a short period of time, he managed to obtain all the Malay rulers’ approval. The reasons for their agreement, despite the loss of political power that it entailed for the Malay rulers, has been much debated; the consensus appears to be that the main reasons were that as the Malay rulers were of course resident during the Japanese occupation, they were open to the accusation of collaboration, and that they were threatened with dethronement. Hence the approval was given, though it was with utmost reluctance.
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Malaysia
Malaysia (i/məˈleɪʒə/ mə-LAY-zhə or i/məˈleɪsiə/ mə-LAY-see-ə) is a federal constitutional monarchy in Southeast Asia. It consists of thirteen states and three federal territories and has a total landmass of 329,847 square kilometres (127,350 sq mi) separated by the South China Sea into two similarly sized regions, Peninsular Malaysia and Malaysian Borneo. Land borders are shared with Thailand, Indonesia, and Brunei, and maritime borders exist with Singapore, Vietnam, and the Philippines. The capital city is Kuala Lumpur, while Putrajaya is the seat of the federal government. In 2010 the population exceeded 27.5 million, with over 20 million living on the Peninsula.
Malaysia has its origins in the Malay Kingdoms present in the area which, from the 18th century, became subject to the British Empire. The first British territories were known as the Straits Settlements, whose establishment was followed by the Malay kingdoms becoming British protectorates. The territories on Peninsular Malaysia were first unified as the Malayan Union in 1946. Malaya was restructured as the Federation of Malaya in 1948, and achieved independence on 31 August 1957. Malaya united with Sabah, Sarawak, and Singapore on 16 September 1963, with si being added to give the new country the name Malaysia. However, less than two years later in 1965, Singapore was expelled from the federation. Since independence, Malaysia has had one of the best economic records in Asia, with GDP growing an average 6.5% for almost 50 years. The economy has traditionally been fuelled by its natural resources, but is expanding in the sectors of science, tourism, commerce and medical tourism.
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Marquesas Islands
Coordinates: 9°27′16″S 139°23′20″W / 9.45444°S 139.38889°W / -9.45444; -139.38889
The Marquesas Islands (French: Îles Marquises or Archipel des Marquises or Marquises; Marquesan: Te Henua (K)enana (North Marquesan) and Te Fenua `Enata (South Marquesan), both meaning "The Land of Men") are a group of volcanic islands in French Polynesia, an overseas collectivity of France in the southern Pacific Ocean. The Marquesas are located at 9° 00S, 139° 30W. The highest point is the peak of Mount Oave (French: Mont Oave) on Ua Pu island at 1,230 m (4,035 ft) above sea level.
The Marquesas Islands form one of the five administrative divisions (subdivisions administratives) of French Polynesia. The capital of the Marquesas Islands administrative subdivision is the settlement of Taiohae on the island of Nuku Hiva. The population of the Marquesas Islands was 8,632 at the August 2007 census.
The first recorded settlers of the Marquessa were Polynesians, who, from archæological evidence, are believed to have arrived before 100 AD. Ethnological and linguistic evidence suggests that they likely arrived from the region of Tonga and Samoa.
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Marshall Islands
The Marshall Islands, officially the Republic of the Marshall Islands (Marshallese: Aolepān Aorōkin M̧ajeļ), is an island country located in the northern Pacific Ocean. Geographically, the country is part of the larger island group of Micronesia, with the population of around 68,000 people spread out over 34 low-lying coral atolls, comprising 1,156 individual islands and islets. The islands share maritime boundaries with the Federated States of Micronesia to the west, Wake Island to the north,Kiribati to the south-east, and Nauru to the south. The most populous atoll is Majuro, which also acts as the capital.
Micronesian colonists gradually settled the Marshall Islands during the 2nd millennium BC, with inter-island navigation made possible using traditional stick charts. Islands in the archipelago were first explored by Europeans in the 1520s, with Spanish explorer Alonso de Salazar sighting an atoll in August 1526. Other expeditions by Spanish and English ships followed, with the islands' current name stemming from British explorer John Marshall. Recognised as part of the Spanish East Indies in 1874, the islands were sold to Germany in 1884, and became of German New Guinea in 1885. The Empire of Japan occupied the Marshall Islands in World War I, which were later joined with other former German territories in 1919 by the League of Nations to form the South Pacific Mandate. In World War II, the islands were conquered by the United States in the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign. Along with other Pacific Islands, the Marshall Islands were then consolidated into the United-States-governed Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands. Self-government was achieved in 1979, and full sovereignty in 1986, under a Compact of Free Association with the United States.
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Mauritius
Coordinates: 20°12′S 57°30′E / 20.2°S 57.5°E / -20.2; 57.5
Mauritiusi/məˈrɪʃəs/ (Mauritian Creole: Moris; French: Maurice, pronounced: [mɔˈʁis]), officially the Republic of Mauritius (Mauritian Creole: Republik Moris; French: République de Maurice) is an island nation off the southeast coast of the African continent in the southwest Indian Ocean, about 870 kilometres (540 mi) east of Madagascar. In addition to the island of Mauritius, the Republic includes the islands of Cargados Carajos, Rodrigues, Tromelin and the Agalega Islands. Mauritius Island is part of the Mascarene Islands, with the French island of Réunion 170 km (110 mi) to the southwest and the island of Rodrigues 570 km (350 mi) to the east. The area of Mauritius is 2040 km2; its capital city is Port Louis.
The United Kingdom took control of the islands in 1810, from France during the Napoleonic Wars, and Mauritius became independent from the UK in 1968. It is a parliamentary republic and is a member of the Southern African Development Community, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, the African Union, La Francophonie and the Commonwealth of Nations.
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Montserrat
Coordinates: 16°45′N 62°12′W / 16.75°N 62.2°W / 16.75; -62.2
Montserrat ( /mɒntsəˈræt/) is an island that is a British overseas territory located in the Leeward Islands, part of the chain of islands called the Lesser Antilles in the West Indies. This island measures approximately 16 km (9.9 mi) long and 11 km (6.8 mi) wide, giving 40 kilometres (25 mi) of coastline. Montserrat is nicknamed the Emerald Isle of the Caribbean both for its resemblance to coastal Ireland and for the Irish ancestry of some of its inhabitants.
Montserrat's Georgian era historic capital city of Plymouth was destroyed and two-thirds of the island's population was forced to flee because of an eruption of the previously dormant Soufriere Hills volcano that began on July 18, 1995. The eruption continues today on a much reduced scale, the damage being confined to the area around Plymouth, including its docking facilities, and also the area around the former W. H. Bramble Airport on the eastern side of the island, the remnants of which were buried by flows from volcanic activity on February 11, 2010.
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Mosquito Coast
The Caribbean Mosquito Coast (or Miskito Coast) historically comprised an area along the eastern coast of present-day Nicaragua and Honduras, and part of the Western Caribbean Zone. It was named after the local Miskito Indians and long dominated by British interests. The Mosquito Coast was incorporated into Nicaragua in 1894; however, in 1860 the northern part was granted to Honduras by the International Court of Justice.
Although its name sometimes applies to the whole eastern seaboard of Nicaragua — and even to La Mosquitia in Honduras, i.e., the coast region as far west as the Río Negro or Tinto – the Mosquito Coast more accurately comprised a narrow strip of territory, fronting the Caribbean Sea, and extending from about 11°45’ to 14°10’ N. It stretched inland for an average distance of 40 miles (64 km), and measured about 225 miles (362 km) from north to south. In the north, its boundary skirted the Wawa River; in the west, it corresponded with the eastern limit of the Nicaraguan highlands; in the south, it followed the Río Rama. The chief modern towns are Bluefields or Blewfields, the largest town and capital of Nicaragua's Región Autónoma del Atlántico Sur, Magdala on Pearl Cay, Prinzapolka on the river of that name, Wounta near the mouth of the Kukalaya, and Carata near the mouth of the coco River.
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Mutiny on the Bounty
The mutiny on the Bounty was a mutiny that occurred aboard the British Royal Navy ship HMS Bounty on 28 April 1789, and has been commemorated by several books, films, and popular songs, many of which take considerable liberties with the facts. The mutiny was led by Fletcher Christian against the commanding officer, William Bligh. According to most accounts, the sailors were attracted to the idyllic life on the Pacific island of Tahiti and repelled by the harsh treatment from their captain.
Eighteen mutineers set Lieutenant Bligh and 18 of the 22 crew loyal to him afloat in a small boat. Mutineers then settled on Pitcairn Island or in Tahiti. The Bounty was subsequently burned off Pitcairn Island to avoid detection and to prevent desertion. Descendants of some of the mutineers and Tahitians still live on Pitcairn island.
After Bligh and his crew of 18 made an epic and eventful journey in the small boat to Timor in the Dutch East Indies, he returned to England and reported the mutiny.
His Majesty's Ship (HMS) Bounty began her career as the collier Bethia, a relatively small sailing ship built in 1784 at the Blaydes shipyard in Hull. Later, she was bought by the Royal Navy for £2,600 on 26 May 1787 (JJ Colledge/D Lyon say 23 May), refitted, and renamed Bounty.
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Nauru
Coordinates: 0°31′38″S 166°56′12″E / 0.527288°S 166.936724°E / -0.527288; 166.936724
Nauru (Englishi/nɑːˈuːruː/ nah-OO-roo), officially the Republic of Nauru and formerly known as Pleasant Island, is an island country in Micronesia in the South Pacific. Its nearest neighbour is Banaba Island in Kiribati, 300 kilometres (186 mi) to the east. Nauru is the world's smallest republic, covering just 21 square kilometres (8.1 sq mi). With just over 9,322 residents, it is the second least-populated country after Vatican City.
Settled by Micronesian and Polynesian people, Nauru was annexed and claimed as a colony by the German Empire in the late 19th century. After World War I, Nauru became a League of Nations mandate administered by Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. During World War II, Nauru was occupied by Japanese troops, who were bypassed by the Allied advance across the Pacific. After the war ended, it entered into trusteeship again. Nauru gained its independence in 1968.
Throughout the first half of the 20th century, Nauru was a "rentier state". Nauru is a phosphate rock island, with rich deposits close to the surface, which allow for simple strip mining operations; moreover, it has some phosphate reserves which are presently (as of 2011) not economically viable for extraction. Nevertheless, this island was a major exporter of phosphate starting in 1907, when the Pacific Phosphate Company began mining there, through the formation of the British Phosphate Commission in 1919, and continuing after independence. This returned to Nauru full control of its minerals under the Nauru Phosphate Corporation, until the deposits ran out during the 1980s. For this reason, Nauru briefly boasted the highest per-capita income enjoyed by any sovereign state in the world during the late 1960s and early 1970s.
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New Caledonia
Coordinates: 21°15′S 165°18′E / 21.25°S 165.30°E / -21.25; 165.30
New Caledonia (French: Nouvelle-Calédonie) is a special collectivity of France located in the southwest Pacific Ocean, 1,500 kilometres (930 mi) east of Australia and about 20,000 kilometres (12,000 mi) from Metropolitan France. The archipelago, part of the Melanesia subregion, includes the main island of Grande Terre, the Loyalty Islands, the Belep archipelago, the Isle of Pines and a few remote islets. The Chesterfield Islands in the Coral Sea are also part of New Caledonia. Locals refer to Grande Terre as "Le Caillou", the rock.
New Caledonia has a land area of 18,576 square kilometres (7,172 sq mi). The population (2011 estimate) is 256,275. The capital of the territory is Nouméa.
The earliest traces of human presence in New Caledonia date back to the Lapita period. The Lapita were highly skilled navigators and agriculturists with influence over a large area of the Pacific.
The British first sighted New Caledonia on September 4, 1774, during the second voyage of Captain James Cook. He named the territory New Caledonia, as the north-east of the island reminded him of Scotland. The west coast of Grande Terre was approached by Jean-François de Galaup, comte de Lapérouse in 1788, shortly before his disappearance, and the Loyalty Islands were first visited in 1796. From then until 1840, only a few sporadic contacts with the archipelago were recorded. Contacts became more frequent after 1840, because of the interest in sandalwood from New Caledonia.
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New Hebrides
New Hebrides was the colonial name for an island group in the South Pacific that now forms the nation of Vanuatu. The New Hebrides were colonized by both the British and French in the 18th century shortly after Captain James Cook visited the islands. The two countries eventually signed an agreement making the islands an Anglo-French condominium, which lasted from 1906 until 1980, when the New Hebrides gained their independence as Vanuatu.
The Condominium divided the New Hebrides into two separate communities — one Anglophone and one Francophone. This divide continues even after independence, with schools either teaching in one language or the other, and between different political parties.
The New Hebrides were a unique form of colonial territory in which sovereignty was shared by two great powers – Britain and France – instead of exercised by just one. Under the Condominium there were three separate governments – one French, one British, and one joint administration that was partially elected after 1975.
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New Zealand
New Zealand (Māori: Aotearoa) is an island country located in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The country geographically comprises two main landmasses ‒ that of the North and South Islands ‒ as well as numerous smaller islands. New Zealand is situated some 1,500 kilometres (900 mi) east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and roughly 1,000 kilometres (600 mi) south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga. Because of its remoteness, it was one of the last lands to be settled by humans.
During its long isolation, New Zealand developed a distinctive biodiversity of both animal and plant life. Most notable are the large number of unique bird species, many of which became extinct after the arrival of humans and introduced mammals. With a mild maritime climate, the land was mostly covered in forest. The country's varied topography and its sharp mountain peaks owe much to the tectonic uplift of land and volcanic eruptions caused by the Pacific and Indo-Australian Plates clashing beneath the earth's surface.
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Niue
Niue ( /ˈnjuːeɪ/ NEW-ay; Niuean: Niuē) is an island country in the South Pacific Ocean. It is commonly known as the "Rock of Polynesia", and inhabitants of the island call it "the Rock" for short. Niue is 2,400 kilometres (1,500 mi) northeast of New Zealand in a triangle between Tonga to the southwest, the Samoas to the northwest, and the Cook Islands to the southeast. The land area is 260 square kilometres (100 sq mi) with about 1,400 people who are predominantly Polynesian.
Though self-governing, Niue is in free association with New Zealand, and lacks full sovereignty. All Niueans are New Zealand citizens and Queen Elizabeth II is Niue's head of state in her capacity as Queen of New Zealand. Most diplomatic relations are conducted by New Zealand on Niue's behalf. 90-95% of Niuean people live in New Zealand, along with about 70% of the speakers of the Niuean language.[citation needed]
In 2003, Niue became the world's first "WiFi nation", in which free wireless Internet access is provided throughout the country by The Internet Users Society-Niue.
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Norfolk Island
Norfolk Island (i/ˈnɔrfək ˈaɪlənd/; Norfuk: Norfuk Ailen) is a small island in the Pacific Ocean located between Australia, New Zealand and New Caledonia, 1,412 kilometres (877 mi) directly east of mainland Evans Head, and about 600 kilometres (370 mi) from Lord Howe Island. The island is part of the Commonwealth of Australia, but it enjoys a large degree of self-governance. Together with two neighbouring islands, it forms one of Australia's external territories.
Originally colonised by East Polynesians, Norfolk Island was colonised by Britain as part of its settlement in Australia in 1788. It then served as a convict penal settlement until 1794, when it was abandoned until 1856, when permanent residence on the island for civilians began. In 1901, the island became a part of the Commonwealth of Australia which it has remained until this day.
The evergreen Norfolk Island pine is a symbol of the island and thus pictured on its flag (see illustration). Native to the island, the pine is a key export industry for Norfolk Island, being a popular ornamental tree on mainland Australia, where two related species grow, and also in Europe.
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North Borneo
North Borneo was a British protectorate under the sovereign North Borneo Chartered Company from 1882 to 1946. After the war it became a crown colony of Great Britain from 1946 to 1963, known in this time as British North Borneo. It is located on the northeastern end of the island of Borneo. It is now the state of Sabah, East Malaysia. The last Governor of North Borneo was William Allmond Codrington Goode who held office from 1959 to 1963.
In 1865, the United States Consul to Brunei, Charles Lee Moses, obtained a 10-year lease for the territory of North Borneo from the Sultan of Brunei. However, the post-Civil War United States wanted nothing to do with Asian colonies, so Moses sold his rights to the Hong Kong-based American Trading Company of Borneo owned by Joseph William Torrey, Thomas Bradley Harris, Tat Cheong and possibly other Chinese merchants. Torrey began a settlement at the Kimanis River mouth, which he named Ellena. Attempts to find financial backing for the settlement were futile, and disease, death and desertion by the immigrant labourers led to the abandonment of the settlement towards the end of 1866. Harris died in 1866 and Torrey returned to America in 1877, he died in Boston, Massachusetts, in March 1884.
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Northern Rhodesia
Northern Rhodesia was a territory in south central Africa, formed in 1911. It became independent in 1964 as Zambia.
It was initially administered under charter by the British South Africa Company and formed by it in 1911 by amalgamating North-Western Rhodesia and North-Eastern Rhodesia. Although it had features of a charter colony the territory's treaties and charter gave it protectorate status. From 1924 it was administered by the British government as an official British protectorate.
The geographical, as opposed to political, term "Rhodesia" referred to a region generally comprising the areas that are today Zambia and Zimbabwe. From 1964 it only referred to the former Southern Rhodesia.
The name "Rhodesia" was derived from Cecil John Rhodes, the British empire-builder who was a guiding figure in British expansion north of the Limpopo River into south-central Africa. Rhodes pushed British influence into the region by obtaining mineral rights from local chiefs under questionable circumstances. After making a vast fortune in mining in South Africa, it was his ambition to extend the British Empire north, all the way to Cairo if possible. He sent European settlers into the territory that became Southern Rhodesia, and encouraged and financed British expeditions to bring areas north of the Zambezi into the British sphere of influence.
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Nuguria
Nuguria or the Nuguria Islands, also known as the Abgarris or Fead Islands, are a Polynesian outlier and islands of Papua New Guinea. They are located nearly 200 km northeast of New Ireland and consist of two closely spaced atoll formations.
Historical commentary from a frequent visitor to Nuguria: Momentum
Coordinates: 3°20′00″S 154°45′00″E / 3.33333°S 154.75°E / -3.33333; 154.75
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Nukumanu Islands
Nukumanu, formerly Tasman Islands, is a medium sized atoll located in the Southwestern Pacific Ocean, 4 degrees south of the equator.
Administratively Nukumanu is part of Papua New Guinea, but it lies quite far away from the closest territory of Papua New Guinea proper, which is the coast of New Ireland at 682 km to the west. The nearest land is Ontong Java Atoll, located only 38 km to the south of Nukumanu, but the border between Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands runs between these neighboring atolls.
Comprising a ring of more than twenty islets on a reef surrounding a large lagoon, Nukumanu's sandy islands are located on a strip of coral rising no more than a meter above sea level. The main inhabited islands of Nukumanu are located on the eastern end of the atoll.
In Polynesian history, the main cultural and commercial exchanges took place with the inhabitants of neighboring Ontong Java Atoll, with whom Nukumanu people share many cultural affinities.
Towards the end of the 19th century Nukumanu became part of the German colonial empire. It was transferred to Australian administration in 1914, after Germany's defeat in World War I.
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Nukunonu
Nukunonu is a group of coral islets within Tokelau in the south Pacific Ocean. Covering 5.5 km², it is the largest of the three islands that constitute Tokelau, and is composed of an atoll surrounding a central lagoon, which itself covers some 90 km². According to the 2006 census 426 people live on Nukunonu, of which more than 95% belong to the Catholic Church.
The main settlement on the atoll is located on Nukunonu Island at the southwestern edge of the lagoon with a concrete bridge joining the two areas of settlement. Other islets in the group include Motuhaga, Te Puka e Mua, Ahua, Motufala, Punalei, Taulagapapa, Niututahi, Saumagalu, Apia, Laulauia, Avakilikili, Fatigauhu, Tokelau, Te Fakanava, Te Puku, and Te Kamu to name a few.
Tokelau has one hotel, the Luana Liki Hotel, and one resort, Falefa Resort, both situated on Nukunonu. Few tourists visit the country and tourism is not widely promoted. There is ambivalence to the idea of tourists with some Tokelauans wanting to keep the country unaffected by the outside world. Despite this, visitors are greeted with traditional Polynesian hospitality. The Luana Liki Hotel functions mainly to accommodate official visitors who have included the New Zealand Prime Minister and Governor General. There is one main shop in Nukunonu which sells a limited range of products. Due to the vagaries of shipping schedules it is at times short of goods.
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Nukuoro
Nukuoro is an atoll in the Federated States of Micronesia.
It is a municipality of the state of Pohnpei, Federated States of Micronesia. Except for Kapingamarangi, it is the southermost atoll of the country. Nukuoro has a population of 372 (as of 2007), though several hundred Nukuorans live on Pohnpei. The total area, including the lagoon, is 40 km², with a land area of only 1.7 km², which is divided among more than 40 islets that lie on the northern, eastern and southern sides of the lagoon. By far the largest islet is Nukuoro islet, which is the center of population and the capital of the municipality.
The lagoon is 6 kilometers (about 3.7 miles) in diameter. Fishing, animal husbandry, and agriculture (taro and copra) are the main occupations. A recent project to farm black pearl oysters has been successful at generating additional income for the island's people. Nukuoro is remote. It has no airstrip, and a passenger boat calls irregularly only once every few months. The island has no tourism except for the occasional visit by passing sailing yachts. There is a 4 room schoolhouse but children over the age of 14 must travel to Pohnpei to attend high school.
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Orchid Island
Coordinates: 22°03′N 121°32′E / 22.05°N 121.533°E / 22.05; 121.533
Orchid Island (Yami language: Ponso no Tao or Pongso no Tao; Chinese: 蘭嶼; pinyin: Lán Yǔ; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Lân-sū) is a 45 km² volcanic island off the southeastern coast of Taiwan Island and separated from the Batanes of the Philippines by the Bashi Channel of the Luzon Strait. It is governed as Lanyu Township of Taitung County.
The island is home to the Tao, an ethnic minority group who migrated to the island from the Batan Archipelago 800 years ago. The island is known to them as Ponso no Tao or Pongso no Tawo (island of the people) or Irala. Out of a total current population of 4,000, approximately 2,400 belong to the aboriginal Tao community and the remaining 1,600 are mainly Han Chinese. In neighboring Philippines the island is referred to as Botel Tobago.
The Lanyu nuclear waste storage facility was built in 1982. The plant receives nuclear waste from Taiwan's three nuclear power plants operated by state utility Taiwan Power Company (Taipower). About 100,000 barrels of nuclear waste from the nation’s three operational nuclear power plants have been stored at the Lanyu complex. In 2002 and 2012, there were major protests from local residents, calling on Taipower to remove the nuclear waste from the island.
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Oregon Country
The Oregon Country was a predominantly American term referring to a disputed ownership region of the Pacific Northwest of North America. The region was occupied by British and French Canadian fur traders from before 1810, and American settlers from the mid-1830s, with its coastal areas north from the Columbia River frequented by ships from all nations engaged in the maritime fur trade, most of these from the 1790s through 1810s being Boston-based. The Oregon Treaty of 1846 ended disputed joint occupancy pursuant to the Treaty of 1818 and established the British-American boundary at the 49th parallel.
Oregon was a distinctly American term for the region. The British used the term Columbia District instead. The Oregon Country consisted of the land north of 42°N latitude, south of 54°40′N latitude, and west of the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean. The area now forms part of the present day Canadian province of British Columbia, all of the US states of Oregon, Washington, and Idaho, and parts of Montana and Wyoming. The British presence in the region was generally administered by the Hudson's Bay Company, whose Columbia Department comprised most of the Oregon Country and extended considerably north into New Caledonia and beyond 54°40′N, with operations reaching tributaries of the Yukon River.
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Ouvéa
Coordinates: 20°39′08″S 166°33′43″E / 20.6522°S 166.5619°E / -20.6522; 166.5619
Ouvéa (local pronunciation: [uˈve.a]) is a commune in the Loyalty Islands Province of New Caledonia, an overseas territory of France in the Pacific Ocean. The settlement of Fayaoué [faˈjawe], on Ouvéa Island, is the administrative centre of the commune of Ouvéa.
Ouvéa is made up of Ouvéa Island, the smaller Mouli Island and Faiava Island, and several islets around these three islands. All these lie among the Loyalty Islands, to the northeast of New Caledonia's mainland.
In April 1988, a bloody hostage taking took place on Ouvéa. Four gendarmes were killed and twenty-seven were held hostage in a cave by supporters of FLNKS. Twelve of the captured gendarmes were released after a while, but six members of a French anti-terrorist squad were also taken hostage. When negotiations to release those taken hostage did not succeed, French security forces besieged the cave and freed the hostages. Eighteen Kanaks and two gendarmes were left dead, and in the aftermath, it was alleged that three Kanaks had been executed or left to die after being arrested.
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Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.
At 165.2 million square kilometres (64.1 million square miles) in area, this largest division of the World Ocean – and, in turn, the hydrosphere – covers about 46% of the Earth's water surface and about one-third of its total surface area, making it larger than all of the Earth's land area combined. The equator subdivides it into the North Pacific Ocean and South Pacific Ocean, with two exceptions: the Galápagos and Gilbert Islands, while straddling the equator, are deemed wholly within the South Pacific. The Mariana Trench in the western North Pacific is the deepest point in the world, reaching a depth of 10,911 metres (35,797 ft).
The eastern Pacific Ocean was first sighted by Europeans early in the 16th century. Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama in 1513 and named it Mar del Sur (South Sea). The ocean's current name was given by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan during the Spanish expedition of world circumnavigation in 1521, who encountered favourable winds as he reached the ocean and called it Mar Pacifico in Portuguese, meaning "peaceful sea".
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Palau
Palau (i/pəˈlaʊ/, sometimes spelled Belau or Pelew), officially the Republic of Palau (Palauan: Beluu ęr a Belau), is an island country located in the western Pacific Ocean. Geographically part of the larger island group of Micronesia, with the country's population of around 21,000 people spread out over 250 islands forming the western chain of the Caroline Islands. The islands share maritime boundaries with Indonesia, the Philippines, and the Federated States of Micronesia. The most populous island in the group is Koror, with the capital city, Ngerulmud, located on nearby Babeldaob.
The country were originally settled around 3000 years ago by migrants from the Philippines, with a Negrito population sustained until around 900 years ago. The islands were first visited by Europeans in the 18th century, and were made part of the Spanish East Indies in 1885. Following Spain's defeat in the Spanish–American War in 1898, the islands were sold to Imperial Germany in 1899 under the terms of the German–Spanish Treaty, where they were administered as part of German New Guinea. The Imperial Japanese Navy conquered Palau during World War I, and the islands were later made a part of the Japanese-ruled South Pacific Mandate by the League of Nations. During World War II, skirmishes, including the major Battle of Peleliu, were fought between American and Japanese troops as part of the Mariana and Palau Islands campaign. Along with other Pacific Islands, Palau was made a part of the United States-governed Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands in 1947. Having voted against joining the newly-independent Federated States of Micronesia in 1979, the islands gained full sovereignty in 1994 under a Compact of Free Association with the United States.
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Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea (PNG; Tok Pisin: Papua Niugini), officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is a country in Oceania, occupying the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and numerous offshore islands (the western portion of the island is a part of the Indonesian provinces of Papua and West Papua). It is located in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, in a region defined since the early 19th century as Melanesia. The capital is Port Moresby.
Papua New Guinea is one of the most culturally diverse countries on Earth. According to recent data, 841 different languages are listed for the country, although 11 of these have no known living speakers. . (A detailed series of language maps of Papua New Guinea may be found at Ethnologue) There may be at least as many traditional societies,out of a population of about 6.2 million. It is also one of the most rural, as only 18% of its people live in urban centres. The country is one of the world's least explored, culturally and geographically, and many undiscovered species of plants and animals are thought to exist in the interior of Papua New Guinea.
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Peru
Perui/pəˈruː/ (Spanish: Perú; Quechua: Perú;Aymara: Piruw), officially the Republic of Peru (Spanish: República del Perú, pronounced: [reˈpuβlika ðel peˈɾu] ( listen)), is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean.
Peruvian territory was home to ancient cultures, spanning from the Norte Chico civilization, one of the oldest in the world, to the Inca Empire, the largest state in Pre-Columbian America. The Spanish Empire conquered the region in the 16th century and established a Viceroyalty, which included most of its South American colonies. After achieving independence in 1821, Peru has undergone periods of political unrest and fiscal crisis as well as periods of stability and economic upswing.
Peru is a representative democratic republic divided into 25 regions. Its geography varies from the arid plains of the Pacific coast to the peaks of the Andes Mountains and the tropical forests of the Amazon Basin. It is a developing country with a high Human Development Index score and a poverty level around 31%. Its main economic activities include agriculture, fishing, mining, and manufacturing of products such as textiles.
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Philippines
The Philippinesi/ˈfɪlɨpiːnz/ FI-lə-peenz (Filipino: Pilipinas [ˌpɪlɪˈpinɐs]), officially known as the Republic of the Philippines (Filipino: Republika ng Pilipinas) is a sovereign country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam. The Sulu Sea to the southwest lies between the country and the island of Borneo, and to the south the Celebes Sea separates it from other islands of Indonesia. It is bounded on the east by the Philippine Sea. Its location on the Pacific Ring of Fire and its tropical climate make the Philippines prone to earthquakes and typhoons but have also endowed the country with natural resources and made it one of the richest areas of biodiversity in the world. An archipelago comprising 7,107 islands, the Philippines is categorized broadly into three main geographical divisions: Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. Its capital city is Manila.
With an estimated population of about 98 million people, the Philippines is the 7th most populated Asian country and the 12th most populated country in the world. An additional 12.5 million Filipinos live overseas. Multiple ethnicities and cultures are found throughout the islands. In prehistoric times, Negritos were some of the archipelago's earliest inhabitants. They were followed by successive waves of Austronesian peoples who brought with them influences from Malay, Hindu, and Islamic societies. Trade introduced Chinese cultural influences which remain to this day.
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Pileni
Coordinates: 10°11′S 166°10′E / 10.183°S 166.167°E / -10.183; 166.167
Pileni is a culturally important island in the Reef Islands, in the northern part of the Solomon Islands province of Temotu. Despite its location in Melanesia, the population of the islands is Polynesian.
Pileni once gave its name to the Samoic-Outlier language spoken there. What used to be called Pileni is now more commonly referred to under its native name Vaeakau-Taumako.
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Pitcairn Islands
The Pitcairn Islands ( /ˈpɪtkɛərn/;Pitkern: Pitkern Ailen), officially named the Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie and Oeno Islands, form a group of four volcanic islands in the southern Pacific Ocean. The islands are a British Overseas Territory. The four islands—named Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie, and Oeno—are spread over several hundred miles of ocean and have a total land area of about 18 square miles (47 km2). Only Pitcairn, the second largest and measuring about 2 miles (3.2 km) across, is inhabited.
The islands are best known as home of the descendants of the Bounty mutineers and the Tahitians (or Polynesians) who accompanied them, an event retold in numerous books and films. This history is still apparent in the surnames of many of the islanders. With only about 48 inhabitants (currently from four main families: Christian, Warren, Young, and Brown), Pitcairn is the least populous jurisdiction in the world. The United Nations Committee on Decolonisation includes the Pitcairn Islands on the United Nations list of Non-Self-Governing Territories.
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Ross Dependency
The Ross Dependency is a region of Antarctica defined by a sector originating at the South Pole, passing along longitudes 160° east to 150° west, and terminating at latitude 60° south. New Zealand's claim to the region was formalized in 1923, when the Governor-General of New Zealand was appointed as the Governor of the Ross Dependency by an Imperial Order in Council made in London, United Kingdom. Since the Antarctic Treaty came into force in 1961, Article 1 of which states "The treaty does not recognize, dispute, nor establish territorial sovereignty claims; no new claims shall be asserted while the treaty is in force", most countries do not recognise territorial claims in Antarctica.
The Dependency takes its name from Sir James Clark Ross, who discovered the Ross Sea, and includes part of Victoria Land, and most of the Ross Ice Shelf. Ross Island, Balleny Islands and the small Scott Island also form part of the Dependency, as does the ice-covered Roosevelt Island.
The scientific bases of Scott Base (New Zealand) and McMurdo Station (USA) are the only permanently occupied human habitations in the area, though Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station is partially within the territory and dependent on logistics operations based in New Zealand. The Dependency has a snow runway at Williams Field, and depending on conditions and time of year, two Ice Runways. This guarantees accessibility by wheeled and ski equipped aircraft year round.
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Rotuma
Rotuma is a Fijian dependency, consisting of Rotuma Island and nearby islets. The island group is home to a small but unique indigenous ethnic group which constitutes a recogniseable minority within the population of Fiji, known as "Rotumans". Its population at the 2007 census was 2,002, although many Rotumans live on mainland Fijian islands, totaling 10,000.
These volcanic islands are located 646 kilometres (Suva to Ahau) north of Fiji. Rotuma Island itself is 13 kilometres long and 4 kilometres wide, with a land area of approximately 43 square kilometres. The island is bisected into a larger eastern part, and a western peninsula, by a low narrow isthmus only 230 meters wide, the location of Motusa village (Itu'ti'u district). North of the isthmus is Maka Bay, and in the south Hopmafau Bay. The bays are full of coral reefs, through which there are boat passages.
Rotuma is a shield volcano made of alkali-olivine basalt and hawaiite, with many small cones, and reaches 256 metres (840 ft) above sea level at Mount Suelhof near the center of the island. Satarua Peak, 166 meters high, lies near the eastern end of the island. While very secluded from much of Fiji proper, the large reef and untouched beaches are renowned as some of the most beautiful in all of Fiji.
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Saint Helena
Saint Helena ( /ˌseɪnt həˈliːnə/ SAYNT-hə-LEE-nə), named after Saint Helena of Constantinople, is an island of volcanic origin in the South Atlantic Ocean. It is part of the British overseas territory of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha which also includes Ascension Island and the islands of Tristan da Cunha. Saint Helena measures about 16 by 8 kilometres (10 by 5 mi) and has a population of 4,255 (2008 census).
The island was uninhabited when discovered by the Portuguese in 1502. It is one of the most isolated islands in the world. For centuries, it was an important stopover for ships sailing to Europe from Asia and South Africa. The British also used the island as a place of exile, most notably for Napoleon I, Dinuzulu kaCetshwayo and more than 5,000 Boer prisoners. Saint Helena is Britain's second oldest remaining colony (now termed overseas territory), after Bermuda.
Most historical accounts state that the island was discovered on 21 May 1502 by the Galician navigator João da Nova sailing at the service of the Portuguese Crown, and that he named it "Santa Helena" after Helena of Constantinople. Another theory holds that the island found by De Nova was actually Tristan da Cunha 2,430 kilometres (1,510 mi) to its south, and that Saint Helena was discovered by some of the ships attached to the squadron of Estêvão da Gama expedition on 30 July 1503 (as reported in the account of clerk Thomé Lopes).
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Samoa
Samoa (i/səˈmoʊ.ə/; Samoan: Sāmoa, IPA: [ˌsaːˈmoa]), officially the Independent State of Samoa (Samoan: Malo Sa'oloto Tuto'atasi o Sāmoa), formerly known as Western Samoa, is a country encompassing the western part of the Samoan Islands in the South Pacific Ocean. It became independent from New Zealand in 1962. The two main islands of Samoa are Upolu and one of the biggest islands in Polynesia, Savai'i. The capital city, Apia, and Faleolo International Airport are situated on the island of Upolu.
Samoa was admitted to the United Nations on 15 December 1976. The entire island group, inclusive of American Samoa, was called Navigators Islands by European explorers before the 20th century because of the Samoans' seafaring skills.
The oldest date so far from pre-historic remains in Samoa has been calculated by New Zealand scientists to a likely true age of circa 3,000 years ago from a Lapita site at Mulifanua during the 1970s.
The origins of the Samoans is closely linked to modern research about Polynesia in various scientific disciplines such as genetics, linguistics and anthropology. Scientific research is ongoing although a number of different theories exist; including one proposing that the Samoans originated from Austronesian predecessors during the terminal eastward Lapita expansion period from Southeast Asia and Melanesia between 2,500 and 1,500 BCE. The Samoan origins are currently being reassessed due to new scientific evidence and carbon dating findings from 2003 and onwards.
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Samoan Islands
The Samoan Islands or Samoa Islands is an archipelago covering 3,030 km2 (1,170 sq mi) in the central South Pacific, forming part of Polynesia and the wider region of Oceania. The population of the Samoan Islands is approximately 250,000, sharing a common language, Samoan, a culture, known as fa'a Samoa and an indigenous form of governance called fa'amatai.
Due to colonialism, the Samoa Islands and people were divided by Western powers. Today, the islands have two jurisdictions, the independent country of Samoa in the western half of the islands, and the territory of American Samoa comprising the islands to the east. The two regions are separated by 64 km of ocean. Most Samoans are full-blooded and are one of the largest Polynesian populations in the world.
The oldest date so far from prehistoric remains in the Samoan Islands has been calculated from archaeology in Samoa to a likely true age of circa 1,050 BCE from a Lapita site at Mulifanua wharf on Upolu island.
In 1768, the eastern islands were visited by French explorer Bougainville, who named them the Navigator Islands, a name used by missionaries until about 1845 and in official European dispatches until about 1870.
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Seychelles
Seychelles (i/seɪˈʃɛlz/ say-SHELZ; French: [sɛʃɛl]), officially the Republic of Seychelles (French: République des Seychelles; Creole: Repiblik Sesel), is an island country spanning an archipelago of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean, some 1,500 kilometres (932 mi) east of mainland Africa, northeast of the island of Madagascar.
Other nearby island countries and territories include Zanzibar to the west, Mauritius, Rodrigues, Agalega and Réunion to the south, Comoros and Mayotte to the southwest. Seychelles, with an estimated population of 86,525, has the smallest population of any African state. It also has the highest Human Development Index in Africa.
Scholars assume that Austronesian seafarers, and later Maldivian and Arab traders were the first to visit the uninhabited Seychelles. Remains of Maldivian mariner presence from the 12th century were found in Silhouette Island. The earliest recorded sighting by Europeans took place in 1502 by the Portuguese Admiral Vasco da Gama, who passed through the Amirantes and named them after himself (islands of the Admiral).
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Sikaiana
Sikaiana formerly called Stewart Islands is a small atoll 212 km NE of Malaita. It is almost 14 km in length and its lagoon, known as Te Moana, is totally enclosed by the coral reef. Its total land surface is only 2 km2. There is no safe anchorage close to this atoll, which makes it often inaccessible.
Sikaiana is located Latitude: 8° 25' 0 South and Longitude: 162° 52' 0 East. The main island, located at the easternmost corner, is called Sikaiana. The three small islands in the west of the atoll are Tehaolei, Matuiloto and Matuavi. There are also two artificial islands on the reef, Te Palena and Hakatai'atata.
Administratively Sikaiana is an outlying region of Malaita Province in the Solomon Islands. Sikaiana's population is approximately 300 people of Polynesian descent. In 1856, when Hawai‘i was offered the sovereignty of Sikaiana, the Privy Council voted to accept the cession. King Kamehameha IV approved the action, making Hawai‘i an imperial power of sorts. But there were second thoughts. The great distance of the atoll from Honolulu would make administration impossible, and the cession was never formalized. Some residents have claimed to be native Hawaiians and citizens of the United States. According to these residents, the Stewart Islands were given to King Kamehameha IV in 1856, and therefore the islands were part of the Kingdom of Hawai‘i at the time of the United States' annexation in 1898. The United States disagrees, arguing that the 1898 law annexed only the "Hawaiian Islands and their dependencies", and that the law defined dependencies as the islands named by a report by the Hawaiian Commission that omitted the Stewart Islands. Some residents applied to register to vote in Hawai‘i in 1996, but their applications were turned down by the Hawaiian Sovereignty Election Council.
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Singapore
Singapore (i/ˈsɪŋəpɔər/ SI-ngə-pohr), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, 137 kilometres (85 mi) north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the Singapore Strait to its south. Singapore is highly urbanised but almost half of the country is covered by greenery. More land is being created for development through land reclamation.
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Solomon Islands
Solomon Islandsi/ˈsɒləmən ˈaɪləndz/ is a sovereign state in Oceania, east of Papua New Guinea, consisting of nearly one thousand islands. It covers a land mass of 28,400 square kilometres (11,000 sq mi). The capital, Honiara, is located on the island of Guadalcanal. The nation of the Solomon Islands is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations.
The Solomon Islands are believed to have been inhabited by Melanesian people for many thousands of years. Spanish navigator Álvaro de Mendaña was the first European to arrive in Solomon Islands in 1568 and named them Islas Salomón. The United Kingdom established a protectorate over the Solomon Islands in 1893. In the Second World War there was fierce fighting between the Americans and the Japanese in the Solomon Islands campaign of 1942–45, including the Battle of Guadalcanal.
Self-government was achieved in 1976 and independence two years later. The Solomon Islands is a constitutional monarchy with the Queen of the Solomon Islands, at present Elizabeth II, as the head of state. Gordon Lilo Darcy is the eleventh and current Prime Minister of the Solomon Islands.
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Southern Rhodesia
Southern Rhodesia was the name of the British colony situated north of the Limpopo River and the Union of South Africa. From its independence in 1965 until its extinction in 1980, it was known as Rhodesia. Since 1980 and the institution of a majority African government, the area has been renamed Zimbabwe and all traces of former British, Rhodesian, and white rule, laws, property, and nomenclature have been removed as part of President Robert Mugabe's policy of Africanization.
The territory was originally referred to as 'South Zambezia' but the name 'Rhodesia' came into use in 1895. The designation 'Southern' was adopted in 1901 and dropped from normal usage in 1964 on the break-up of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, and Rhodesia became the name of the country until the creation of Zimbabwe Rhodesia in 1979. Legally, from the British perspective, the name Southern Rhodesia continued to be used until April 18, 1980, when the name Republic of Zimbabwe was formally proclaimed.
Rhodesia was named after Cecil Rhodes, the British empire-builder who was one of the most important figures in British expansion into southern Africa, and who obtained mineral rights in 1888 from the most powerful local traditional leaders through treaties such as the Rudd Concession and the Moffat Treaty signed by King Lobengula of the Ndebele.
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Southland Region
Southland (Māori: 'Murihiku') is New Zealand's southernmost region and is also a district within that region. It consists mainly of the southwestern portion of the South Island and Stewart Island / Rakiura. The region covers over 3.1 million hectares and spans over 3,400 km of coastal stretch.
Southland was a scene of early extended contact between Europeans and Maori, in this case sealers, whalers and missionaries - Wohlers at Ruapuke. In 1853, Walter Mantell purchased Murihiku from local Maori iwi, claiming the land for European settlement. Over successive decades, present-day Southland and Otago were settled by large numbers of Scottish settlers. Immigration to New Zealand had been precipitated by an economic depression in Scotland and a schism between the Church of Scotland and the Free Church of Scotland.[verification needed]
In 1852, James Menzies, leader of the Southland separatist movement, became the first Superintendent of the tiny Southland electorate which was still part of the large Otago Region. Under the influence of Menzies, Southland Province (a small part of the present Region, centred on Invercargill) seceded from Otago in 1861 following the escalation of political tensions.
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Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka (i/ʃriː ˈlɑːŋkə/, /sriːˈlɑːŋkə/, or /sriːˈlæŋkə/;Sinhala: ශ්රී ලංකාව, Tamil: இலங்கை), is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent in South Asia. Known until 1972 as Ceylon ( /sɨˈlɒn/, /seɪˈlɒn/, or /siːˈlɒn/), Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar, the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the Maldives.
As a result of its location in the path of major sea routes, Sri Lanka is a strategic naval link between West Asia and South East Asia. It was an important stop on the ancient Silk Road. Sri Lanka has also been a center of the Buddhist religion and culture from ancient times, being the nation where the Buddhist teachings were first written down as well as the oldest continually Buddhist country. Sri Lanka boasts a diverse range of cultures, languages and religions. The Sinhalese people form the majority of the population; Tamils, who are concentrated in the north and east of the island, form the largest ethnic minority. Other communities include Moors, Burghers, Kaffirs, Malays and the aboriginal Vedda people.
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Straits Settlements
The Straits Settlements were a group of British territories located in Southeast Asia.
Originally established in 1826 as part of the territories controlled by the British East India Company, the Straits Settlements came under direct British control as a crown colony on 1 April 1867. The colony was dissolved in 1946 as part of the British reorganisation of its South-East Asian dependencies following the end of the Second World War.
The Straits Settlements consisted of the four individual settlements of Malacca, Dinding, Penang (also known as Prince of Wales Island), Singapore (with Christmas Island and the Cocos Islands). The island of Labuan, off the coast of Borneo, was also incorporated into the colony with effect from 1 January 1907, becoming a separate settlement within it in 1912. With the exception of Singapore, Christmas Island, and the Cocos Islands, these territories now form part of Malaysia.
The establishment of the Straits Settlements followed the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1824 between the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, by which the Malay archipelago was divided into a British zone in the north and a Dutch zone in the south. This resulted in the exchange of the British settlement of Bencoolen (on Sumatra) for the Dutch colony of Malacca and undisputed control of Singapore. The Settlements were largely Chinese in population, with a tiny but important European minority. Their capital was moved from Penang to Singapore in 1832. Their scattered nature proved to be difficult and, after the Company lost its monopoly in the China trade in 1833, expensive to administer.
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Sultanate of Egypt
The Sultanate of Egypt (Arabic: السلطنة المصرية) is the name of the short-lived protectorate that the United Kingdom imposed over Egypt between 1914 and 1922.
Opposition to European interference in Egypt's affairs resulted in the emergence of a nationalist movement that coalesced and spread after the British military intervention and occupation of 1882. The immediate causes of what is known to Egyptians as the 1919 Revolution, however, were British actions during the war that caused widespread hardship and resentment. Specifically, these included Britain's purchase of cotton and requisitioning of fodder at below market prices, Britain's forcible recruitment of about 500,000 peasants into the Egyptian Labour Corps and the Egyptian Camel Transport Corps in the Egyptian Expeditionary Force, and its use of the country as a base and a garrison populated by British, Australian, and other troops. After the war, Egypt felt the adverse effects of soaring prices and unemployment.
When the war ended, the nationalists began to press the British again for independence. In addition to their other reasons, the Egyptians were influenced by American president Woodrow Wilson, who was preaching self-determination for all nations. In September 1918, Egypt made the first moves toward the formation of a wafd, or delegation, to voice its demands for independence at the Paris Peace Conference. The idea for a wafd had originated among prominent members of the Umma Party, including Lutfi as Sayyid, Saad Zaghlul, Muhammad Mahmud Pasha, Ali Sharawi, and Abd al Aziz Fahmi.
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Sultanate of Sulu
The Sultanate of Sulu Dar al-Islam (Jawi: سلطنة سولو دار الإسلام) was an Islamic Tausūgstate that ruled over many of the islands of the Sulu Sea, in the southern Philippines and several places in northern Borneo. The sultanate was founded in 1457 by a Johore-born Arab explorer and religious scholar Sayyid Abu Bakr Abirin after he settled in Banua Buansa Ummah (ummah is an Arabic term for "community"), Sulu. After the marriage of Abu Bakr and local dayang-dayang (princess) Paramisuli, he founded the sultanate and assumed the title Paduka Mahasari Maulana al Sultan Sharif ul-Hāshim. Sharif ul-Hāshim was a direct descendant of Islamic prophet Muhammad. Currently the issue of who would be the legitimate Sultan of Sulu is disputed by several branches of the Royal Family, although the line of succession fell on the Kiram branch of the royal family from 1823.
The earliest known settlement in the areas soon to be occupied by the sultanate was in Maimbung, Jolo. During these times, Sulu was called Lupah Sug. The Principality of Maimbung, populated by Buranun people (or Budanon, literally means "mountain-dwellers"), was first ruled by a certain rajah who assumed the title Rajah Sipad the Older. According to Majul, the origins of the title rajah sipad originated from the Hindu shri paduka, which symbolizes authority. The Principality was instituted and governed using the system of rajahs. Sipad the Older was succeeded by Sipad the Younger.
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Suriname
Suriname, officially the Republic of Suriname (Dutch: Republiek Suriname, Dutch pronunciation: [ˌrepyˈblik ˌsyriˈnaːmə]), is a country in northern South America. It borders French Guiana to the east, Guyana to the west, Brazil to the south, and the Atlantic Ocean to the north. Suriname was first colonized by the British, and captured by the Dutch in 1667, who governed it as the colony of Suriname until 1954. The country of Suriname achieved independence from the Kingdom of the Netherlands, in which Suriname, the Netherlands Antilles, and the Netherlands itself cooperated on a basis of equality since 1954, on 25 November 1975.
At just under 165,000 km2 (64,000 sq mi) Suriname is the smallest sovereign state in South America (French Guiana comprises less territory, but is French territory). It has an estimated population of approximately 560,000, most of whom live on the country's north coast, where the capital Paramaribo is located.
The name Suriname may derive from a Taino (Arawak-speaking) group called "Surinen" who first inhabited the region prior to European arrival.
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Taiwan
Taiwan (i/ˌtaɪˈwɑːn/ TY-WAHN; Chinese: 臺灣 or 台灣; pinyin: Táiwān; see below), officially the Republic of China (ROC; Chinese: 中華民國; pinyin: Zhōnghuá Mínguó), is a state in East Asia. Originally based in mainland China, the Republic of China now governs the island of Taiwan (formerly known as Formosa), which forms over 99% of its current territory, as well as Penghu, Kinmen, Matsu, and other minor islands. Neighboring states include the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east and northeast, and the Philippines to the south. Taipei is the capital city and economic and cultural centre of the country, and New Taipei is the most populous city.
The earliest evidence of inhabitation of Taiwan dates back to the late Paleolithic era. The island of Taiwan was mainly inhabited by Taiwanese aborigines before being colonized in the 17th century by the Dutch and the Spanish Empire. The first Han Chinese polity on Taiwan began when Koxinga's troops defeated Dutch forces and established the Kingdom of Tungning. The island was subsequently ruled by the Qing Dynasty after the kingdom's defeat in the Battle of Penghu in 1683, a period that lasted for over 200 years. Following Japan's victory over the Qing Dynasty in the first Sino-Japanese war, Taiwan was ceded to Japan under the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895.
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Thailand
Thailand ( /ˈtaɪlænd/ TY-land or /ˈtaɪlənd/;Thai: ประเทศไทย, RTGS: Prathet Thai), officially the Kingdom of Thailand (Thai: ราชอาณาจักรไทย, RTGS: Ratcha Anachak Thai; IPA: [râːt.tɕʰā ʔāːnāːtɕàk tʰāj] (
listen)), formerly known as Siam (Thai: สยาม; RTGS: Sayam), is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the west by the Andaman Sea and the southern extremity of Burma. Its maritime boundaries include Vietnam in the Gulf of Thailand to the southeast, and Indonesia and India in the Andaman Sea to the southwest.
The country is a constitutional monarchy, headed by King Rama IX, the ninth king of the House of Chakri, who, having reigned since 1946, is the world's longest-serving head of state and the longest-reigning monarch in Thai history. The king of Thailand is titled Head of State, Head of the Armed Forces, the Upholder of the Buddhist religion, and the Defender of all Faiths.
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Three Kings Islands
The Three Kings Islands or Manawa Islands (Manawa-tawhi or Ngā Motu Karaka in Māori) are a group of 13 islands about 55 kilometres (34 mi) northwest of Cape Reinga, the northernmost point of the North Island of New Zealand, where the South Pacific Ocean and Tasman Sea converge. They measure about 4.86 km² in area. The islands are situated on a submarine plateau, the Three Kings Bank, and are separated from the New Zealand mainland by an 8 km wide, 200 to 300 m deep submarine trough. Therefore and despite relative proximity to the mainland, the islands are listed with the New Zealand Outlying Islands. The islands are an immediate part of New Zealand, but not part of any region or district, but instead Area Outside Territorial Authority, like all the other outlying islands except Solander Islands.
They were named on 6 January 1643 by Dutch explorer Abel Janszoon Tasman who three weeks earlier had become the first European known to have seen New Zealand.
Tasman anchored at the islands when searching for water. As it was the Twelfth Night feast of the Epiphany, the day the biblical three kings known as the wise men visited Christ the child, he named the islands accordingly. Tasman also named the northern tip of the North Island Cape Maria van Diemen, after the wife of Anthony van Diemen, Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia). These are the only two geographic features in New Zealand to retain the names given to them by Abel Tasman. Tasman found the islands to be inhabited by Māori, but since 1840 they have been uninhabited. The Māori population probably never exceeded 100.
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Tikopia
Tikopia is a small and high island in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. Covering an area of 5 km² (2 sq. mi.), the island is the remnant of an extinct volcano. Its highest point, Mt. Reani, reaches an elevation of 380 m (1,247 ft) above sea level. Lake Te Roto covers an old volcanic crater which is 80 m deep.
Tikopia's location is relatively remote. It is sometimes grouped with the Santa Cruz Islands. Administratively, Tikopia belongs to Temotu Province as the southernmost of the Solomon Islands.
The population of Tikopia is about 1,200, distributed among more than 20 villages mostly along the coast. The largest village is Matautu on the west coast, not to be confused with Mata-Utu, the capital of Wallis and Futuna. Historically, the tiny island has supported a high-density population of a thousand or so. Strict reproductive policy prevented further increase. Unlike most of the Solomon Islands, the inhabitants are Polynesians, their language, Tikopian, is a member of the Samoic branch of the Polynesian languages and is generally referred to as a Polynesian outlier.
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Tokelau
Tokelau ( /ˈtoʊkəlaʊ/) is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1,400. The atolls lie north of the Samoan Islands, east of Tuvalu, south of the Phoenix Islands, southwest of the more distant Line Islands (both island groups belonging to Kiribati) and northwest of the Cook Islands.
The United Nations General Assembly designated Tokelau a Non-Self-Governing Territory. Until 1976 the official name was Tokelau Islands. Tokelau is sometimes referred to by the older, colonial name of The Union Islands.
The name Tokelau is a Polynesian word meaning "North Wind". The islands were named the Union Islands and Union Group by European explorers at an unknown time. Tokelau Islands was adopted as the name in 1946, and was contracted to Tokelau on 9 December 1976.
The change from Tokelau Islands to Tokelau marked a slight shift in emphasis, with consequences in regional diplomacy, in that the term Tokelau Islands clearly and substantially referred to a geographical expression, that is, a range of islands, whatever else it may connote. It is not necessarily controversial to refer by name to a range of islands, even though they may come under two or more political jurisdictions. Tokelau, on the other hand, can be taken to refer more immediately to some concept of nationhood, arguably infusing increased meaning to the draft 2006 independence constitution of Tokelau (which somewhat controversially claims Tokelauan inhabited Olohega (or Swains Island), currently part of American Samoa, as part of its national territory).[citation needed]
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Tonga
Tonga, officially the Kingdom of Tonga (Tongan: Puleʻanga Fakatuʻi ʻo Tonga), is a sovereign state and an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean, comprising 176 islands scattered over 700,000 square kilometres (270,000 sq mi) of ocean in the South Pacific. Fifty-two of the islands are inhabited.
The Kingdom stretches over a distance of about 800 kilometres (500 mi) in a north-south line located at about a third of the distance from New Zealand to Hawaii.
Tonga also became known as the Friendly Islands because of the friendly reception accorded to Captain James Cook on his first visit there in 1773. He happened to arrive at the time of the ʻinasi festival, the yearly donation of the first fruits to the Tuʻi Tonga, the islands' paramount chief, and received an invitation to the festivities. According to the writer William Mariner, in reality the chiefs had wanted to kill Cook during the gathering, but could not agree on a plan.
Tonga is also the only island nation in the region to have avoided formal colonisation. In 2010, Tonga took a decisive step towards becoming a fully functioning constitutional monarchy after legislative reforms paved the way for its first ever fully representative elections which resulted in the election of Noble Sialeʻataongo Tuʻivakanō as its first democratically elected Prime Minister.
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Transjordan
The Emirate of Transjordan (Arabic: إمارة شرق الأردن ʾImārat Sharq al-ʾUrdun), also hyphenated as Trans-Jordan and previously known as Transjordania or Trans-Jordania, was a Hashemite ruled British protectorate established in April 1921, together with the Hashemite Kingdom of Iraq, following the Cairo Conference. The territory was added to the British Mandate for Palestine, but had a fully autonomous governing system from Mandatory Palestine. In 1946, the Emirate became an independent state and in 1951 was officially declared as the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.
Under the Ottoman empire, Transjordan did not correspond to any previous historical, cultural or political division, though most of it belonged to the Vilayet of Syria.
There were extensive pre-existing cultural, linguistic and religious ties between the populations living on the east of the Jordan river with those living on the west of the Jordan river. The inhabitants of northern Jordan had traditionally associated with Syria, and those of southern Jordan with the Arabian Peninsula.
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Transvaal Colony
The Transvaal (Afrikaans, lit. beyond the Vaal River) is the name of an area of northern South Africa. The land originally comprised most of the independent Boer South African Republic, which had existed since 1856, despite two previous attempts by the British of varying success to establish supremacy. After the Anglo-Boer War of 1899–1902 most of the land of the captured state became the Transvaal Colony, and eventually one of the initial provinces of the Union of South Africa.
The Transvaal was colonised by Boer settlers who left the British-dominated Cape Colony during the 1830s and 1840s in what came to be known as the Great Trek. The emigrating Boers established several republics to the north, outside British control - after the British occupation of the former Dutch colony in 1795 and again in 1806. The Great Trek was encouraged by discontent with British rule, the economic changes caused by anti-slavery laws, lack of protection against raiding Xhosa bands, and Anglicisation of established Dutch traditions. Many autonomous groups, each with its own goals, set out. Some, moving north-east, 'behind' the Nguni societies (Xhosa and Zulu), established the first independent republic, Natalia. This was soon occupied by the British in 1843 via their outpost, Port Natal, on the coast. Two years later the voortrekkers established Transoranje, (1845, later the Orange Free State). Finally, the voortrekkers migrated further north and established a number of smaller republics across the Vaal river, in the area known as the Transvaal, later to be united as the Zuid Afrikaanse Republiek (South African Republic), or ZAR.
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Tristan da Cunha
Tristan da Cunha ( /ˈtrɪstən də ˈkuːnə/) is part of the British overseas territory of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha which also includes Saint Helena 2,430 kilometres (1,510 mi) to its north, and equatorial Ascension Island even farther removed.
Tristan da Cunha is a remote volcanic group of islands in the south Atlantic Ocean and the main island of that group. It is the most remote inhabited archipelago in the world, lying 2,816 kilometres (1,750 mi) from the nearest land, South Africa, and 3,360 kilometres (2,088 mi) from South America. The territory consists of the main island of Tristan da Cunha itself, which measures about 11.27 kilometres (7.0 mi) across and has an area of 98 square kilometres (37.8 sq mi), along with the uninhabited Nightingale Islands and the wildlife reserves of Inaccessible Island and Gough Island. It has a permanent population of 275 (2009 figures).
The islands were first sighted in 1506 by Portuguese explorer Tristão da Cunha, although rough seas prevented a landing. He named the main island after himself, Ilha de Tristão da Cunha, which was later anglicised to Tristan da Cunha Island.
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Tuamotus
The Tuamotus or the Tuamotu Archipelago (French: Îles Tuamotu, officially Archipel des Tuamotu) are a chain of islands and atolls in French Polynesia. They form the largest chain of atolls in the world, spanning an area of the Pacific Ocean roughly the size of Western Europe. The Tuamotu islands were originally settled by Polynesians who share a common culture and language.
French Polynesia is a semi-autonomous island group designated as an overseas country of France. The Tuamotus combine with the Gambier Islands to form the Îles Tuamotu-Gambier which is one of the five administrative divisions of French Polynesia.
The Tuamotus are grouped into sixteen communes: Anaa; Arutua; Fakarava; Fangatau; Hao; Hikueru; Makemo; Manihi; Napuka; Nukutavake; Puka Puka; Rangiroa; Reao; Takaroa; Tatakoto; and Tureia.
The communes on Tuamotu are part of two different electoral districts (circonscriptions électorales) represented in the Assembly of French Polynesia. The Îles Gambier et Tuamotu Est electoral district comprises the commune of Gambier and eleven communes in eastern Tuamotu: Anaa; Fangatau; Hao; Hikueru; Makemo; Napuka; Nukutavake; Pukapuka; Reao; Tatakoto; and Tureia. The other five communes in western Tuamotu – Arutua; Fakarava; Manihi; Rangiroa; and Takaroa – form the Îles Tuamotu Ouest electoral district .
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Tuvalu
Tuvalu (i/tuːˈvɑːluː/ too-VAH-loo or /ˈtuːvəluː/ TOO-və-loo), formerly known as the Ellice Islands, is a Polynesian island nation located in the Pacific Ocean, midway between Hawaii and Australia. It comprises four reef islands and five true atolls spread out from 6° to 10° south. Its nearest neighbours are Kiribati, Nauru, Samoa and Fiji. Its population of 10,544 makes it the third-least populous sovereign state in the world, with only Vatican City and Nauru having fewer inhabitants. In terms of physical land size, at just 26 square kilometres (10 sq mi) Tuvalu is the fourth smallest country in the world, larger only than the Vatican City at 0.44 km2 (0.17 sq mi), Monaco at 1.98 km2 (0.76 sq mi) and Nauru at 21 km2 (8.1 sq mi).
The first inhabitants of Tuvalu were Polynesian people. In 1568 Spanish navigator Álvaro de Mendaña sailed through the islands and is understood to have sighted Nui during his expedition in search of Terra Australis. In 1819 the island of Funafuti was named Ellice's Island; the name Ellice was applied to all nine islands after the work of English hydrographer Alexander George Findlay (1812–1876). The islands came under Britain's sphere of influence in the late 19th century, when the Ellice Islands were declared a British protectorate by Captain Gibson, R. N. of HMS Curaçao between 9th and 16 October 1892. The Ellice Islands were administered as British protectorate by a Resident Commissioner from 1892 to 1916 as part of the British Western Pacific Territories (BWPT), and later as part of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands colony from 1916 to 1974.
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United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK, or Britain) is a sovereign state located off the north-western coast of continental Europe. The country includes the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands. Northern Ireland is the only part of the UK that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. Apart from this land border the UK is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, the North Sea, the English Channel and the Irish Sea.
The United Kingdom is a unitary state governed under a constitutional monarchy and a parliamentary system, with its seat of government in the capital city of London. It is a country in its own right and consists of four countries: England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. There are three devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in Belfast, Edinburgh and Cardiff, the capitals of Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. Associated with the UK, but not constitutionally part of it, are three Crown Dependencies. The United Kingdom has fourteen overseas territories. These are remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in 1922, encompassed almost a quarter of the world's land surface and was the largest empire in history. British influence can still be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former territories.
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United States
The United States of America (commonly abbreviated to the United States, the U.S., the USA, America, and the States) is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its forty-eight contiguous states and Washington, D.C., the capital district, lie between the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, bordered by Canada to the north and Mexico to the south. The state of Alaska is in the northwest of the continent, with Canada to the east and Russia to the west, across the Bering Strait. The state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific. The country also possesses several territories in the Pacific and Caribbean.
At 3.79 million square miles (9.83 million km2) and with over 312 million people, the United States is the third or fourth largest country by total area, and the third largest by both land area and population. It is one of the world's most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, the product of large-scale immigration from many countries. The U.S. economy is the world's largest national economy, with an estimated 2011 GDP of $15.1 trillion (22% of nominal global GDP and over 19% of global GDP at purchasing-power parity). Per capita income is the world's sixth-highest.
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Vanuatu
Vanuatu (Englishi/ˌvɑːnuːˈɑːtuː/ vah-noo-AH-too or /vænˈwɑːtuː/ van-WAH-too; Bislama IPA: [vanuaˈtu]), officially the Republic of Vanuatu (French: République de Vanuatu, Bislama: Ripablik blong Vanuatu), is an island nation located in the South Pacific Ocean. The archipelago, which is of volcanic origin, is some 1,750 kilometres (1,090 mi) east of northern Australia, 500 kilometres (310 mi) northeast of New Caledonia, west of Fiji, and southeast of the Solomon Islands, near New Guinea.
Vanuatu was first inhabited by Melanesian people. The first Europeans to visit the islands were the members of a Spanish expedition led by Portuguese navigator Fernandes de Queirós who arrived in Espiritu Santo in 1605. In the 1880s France and the United Kingdom claimed parts of the country, and in 1906 they agreed on a framework for jointly managing the archipelago as the New Hebrides through a British–French Condominium. An independence movement arose in the 1970s, and the Republic of Vanuatu was created in 1980.
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Vietnam
Vietnam ( listen), formally the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (Cộng hòa xã hội chủ nghĩa Việt Nam; listen), is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. With an estimated 91.5 million inhabitants as of 2012, it is the world's 13th-most-populous country, and the eighth-most-populous Asian country. The name Vietnam translates as "South Viet", and was officially adopted in 1945. The country is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea to the east.
The Vietnamese became independent from Imperial China in 938 AD, following the Battle of Bạch Đằng River. Successive Vietnamese royal dynasties flourished as the nation expanded geographically and politically into Southeast Asia, until the Indochina Peninsula was colonized by the French in the mid-19th century. The First Indochina War eventually led to the expulsion of the French in 1954, leaving Vietnam divided politically into two states, North and South Vietnam. Conflict between the two sides intensified, with heavy foreign intervention, during the Vietnam War, which ended with a North Vietnamese victory in 1975.
wn.com/Vietnam -
Wallis and Futuna
Wallis and Futuna, officially the Territory of the Wallis and Futuna Islands (French: Wallis et Futuna or Territoire des îles Wallis et Futuna, Fakauvea and Fakafutuna: Uvea mo Futuna), is a Polynesian French island territory in the South Pacific between Tuvalu to the northwest, Rotuma of Fiji to the west, the main part of Fiji to the southwest, Tonga to the southeast, Samoa to the east, the New Zealand-associated state of Tokelau to the northeast and to a more distant north the Phoenix Islands (Kiribati). (However, Wallis and Futuna is not part of, nor even contiguous with, French Polynesia. Wallis and Futuna is located at the very opposite western end of Polynesia.)
Its land area is 264 km2 with a population of about 15,000. Mata-Utu is the capital and biggest city. The territory is made up of three main volcanic tropical islands along with a number of tiny islets, and is split into two island groups that lie about 260 km apart, namely Wallis Islands (Uvea) in the northeast, and Hoorn Islands (also called the Futuna Islands) in the southwest, including Futuna Island proper and the mostly uninhabited Alofi Island.
wn.com/Wallis_and_Futuna -
Wallis Island
Wallis (Wallisian:ʻUvea) is an island in the Pacific Ocean belonging to the French overseas collectivity (collectivité d'outre-mer, or COM) of Wallis and Futuna. The island is a little Polynesian kingdom with an aristocratic monarchy, ruled by the noble families called the "ʻAliki" through the Customary system, the "Puleʻaga Hau o Lavelua". ("Lavelua and his Kingdom"). The powers are shared between French Administration, Roman Catholic Church, and the Traditional System "Pule'aga Hau". The limits of each one are defined by the Territorial Statute of July 29, 1961, traditionally called "Statut 61" (Wallisian:Tohi Lao).
The island has an area of 77,5 km² and a circumference of c. 50 km. Its highest point is Mount Lulu Fakahega (131 m). There are also a handful of large lakes such as Lake Lalolalo, a sign of the island's volcanic origin, some of them almost perfect circles and with straight vertical walls, like Lalolalo, Lanu'tavake.
Uvea is located 240 km northeast of Futuna and Alofi islands. Together with some 15 smaller islands surrounding it, on its huge barrier reef, it forms the Wallis archipelago. Wallis has a fertile volcanic soil and sufficient rainfall to allow subsistence farming.
wn.com/Wallis_Island -
Weihai
Weihai (Chinese: 威海; pinyin: Wēihǎi) is a city in eastern Shandong Province, People's Republic of China. It is the easternmost prefecture-level city of the province and a major seaport. Between 1898 and 1930, the town was a British colony known as Weihaiwei or the Weihai Garrison (traditional Chinese: 威海衛; simplified Chinese: 威海卫; pinyin: Wēihǎi Wèi), and sometimes as Port Edward. Weihai was not developed in the way that Hong Kong, the other British colony in the region, was developed, because Shandong Province of which Weihaiwei was part of, was inside Germany's sphere of influence and had only been obtained as a counterbalance to the Russian presence at Port Arthur 130 kilometres across the sea in Manchuria. It was largely used as a naval station and a sanatorium. Weihai borders Yantai to the west and the Yellow Sea to the east.
Its population is 2,804,800 at the 2010 census. 591,982 live in the built up area (Huancui urban district). One can notice that Rongcheng, a county level city, has a built up area with 1,006,795 inhabitants.
wn.com/Weihai -
West Florida
West Florida was a region on the north shore of the Gulf of Mexico, which underwent several boundary and sovereignty changes during its history. West Florida was first established in 1763 by the British government; as its name suggests it largely consisted of the western portion of the region called Florida by Spain, with East Florida comprising the eastern part. It included most of what is now the Florida Panhandle, plus parts of the modern U.S. states of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama.
Britain formed West and East Florida out of land taken from France and Spain after the French and Indian War. As the newly acquired territory was too large to govern from one administrative center, the British divided it into two new colonies separated by the Apalachicola River. British West Florida's government was based in Pensacola, and the colony included the part of formerly Spanish Florida west of the Apalachicola, plus the parts of French Louisiana taken by the British. It thus comprised all territory between the Mississippi and Apalachicola Rivers, with a northern boundary that shifted several times over the subsequent years.
wn.com/West_Florida -
West Jersey
West Jersey and East Jersey were two distinct parts of the Province of New Jersey. The political division existed for 28 years, between 1674 and 1702. Determination of an exact location for a border between West Jersey and East Jersey was often a matter of dispute.
The Delaware Valley had been inhabited by the Lenape (or Delaware) Indians prior to exploration and settlement starting around 1609 by the Dutch, Swedish and English. The Dutch West India Company had established one or two Delaware River settlements but by the late 1620s had moved most of their inhabitants to Manhattan which became the center of New Netherlands.
The development of the colony of New Sweden in the lower Delaware began in 1638. Most of the Swedish population was on the west side of the Delaware, but after the New Netherlands' Fort Nassau was re-established to challenge the Swedes, Fort Nya Elfsborg was established in present day Salem County. Fort Nya Elfsborg was located between present day Salem and Alloway Creek near Bridgeport. The New Sweden colony established two primary settlements in New Jersey: Sveaborg, now Swedesboro and Nya Stockholm, now Bridgeport. Trinity Church, located in Swedesboro, was the site of the Church of Sweden for the area.
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Zanzibar
Zanzibar ( /ˈzænzɨbɑr/; from Arabic: زنجبار Zanjibār, from Persian: زنگبار Zangibār "Coast of Blacks"; zangi [black-skinned] + bār [coast]) is a semi-autonomous part of Tanzania, in East Africa. It comprises the Zanzibar Archipelago in the Indian Ocean, 25–50 kilometres (16–31 mi) off the coast of the mainland, and consists of numerous small islands and two large ones: Unguja (the main island, informally referred to as Zanzibar), and Pemba. Other nearby island countries and territories include Comoros and Mayotte to the south, Mauritius and Réunion to the far southeast, and the Seychelles Islands about 1,500 km to the east. Arab and Portuguese traders visited the region in early times, and it was controlled by Omanis in the 18th and 19th centuries. Britain established a protectorate (1890) that became an independent sultanate in December 1963 and a republic after an uprising in January 1964. In April 1964 it joined Tanganyika to form a new republic that was renamed Tanzania in October 1964. The capital of Zanzibar, located on the island of Unguja, is Zanzibar City, and its historic centre, known as Stone Town, is a World Heritage Site.
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Zulu Kingdom
The Zulu Kingdom, sometimes referred to as the Zulu Empire (or rather imprecisely as Zululand) was a monarchy in Southern Africa that extended along the coast of the Indian Ocean from the Tugela River in the south to Pongola River in the north.
The small kingdom grew to dominate much of Southern Africa, but when it came into conflict with the British Empire in the 1870s during the Anglo-Zulu War, it was defeated despite early Zulu victories in the war. The area was subsequently absorbed into the Colony of Natal and later became part of the Union of South Africa.
Shaka Zulu was the illegitimate son of Senzangakona, chief of the Zulus. He was born circa 1787. He and his mother, Nandi, were exiled by Senzangakona, and found refuge with the Mthethwa. Shaka fought as a warrior under Dingiswayo, leader of the Mthethwa Paramountcy. When Senzangakona died, Dingiswayo helped Shaka claim his place as chief of the Zulu Kingdom. After Dingiswayo's death at the hands of Zwide, king of the Ndwandwe, around 1818, Shaka assumed leadership of the entire Mthethwa alliance.
wn.com/Zulu_Kingdom
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Foua Toloa
Foua Toloa is a Tokelauan politician who served as the Head of the Government of Tokelau, or Ulu, from February 21, 2009, to February 21, 2010. He is a member of the Council for the Ongoing Government of Tokelau, and is a faipule on Fakaofo. As the office of Ulu rotates on an annual basis, Toloa resumed office on February 21, 2011. For the period 2011-2013, he is also Tokelau's minister for Finance, Telecommunication, Energy and Transport.
During a trip to Tokelauan communities of New Zealand in September 2009, Toloa advocated a return to observer representation in the Tokelau Fono for Tokelauans living overseas. Toloa stated that bringing back representation for Tokelauans abroad would allow the diaspora to contribute to decisions important to the future of their homeland. Toloa noted that it would be possible for overseas representatives to meet in Apia, Samoa, rather than Tokelau for easier travel."Every General Fono once or twice a year they would come in as representatives to the General Fono, not as delegates but as observers and they can voice their opinion in terms of issues that are discussed with the General Fono, but when it comes to the voting, they are not allowed to vote.” Toloa’s visit to New Zealand was part of a series of discussions with Tokelauan communities living in New Zealand and Australia.
wn.com/Foua_Toloa -
French people
The French (French: Français) are a nation that share a common French culture and speak the French language as a mother tongue. Historically, the French population are descended from peoples of Celtic, Latin and Germanic origin, and are today a mixture of several ethnic groups. Within France, the French are defined by citizenship, regardless of ancestry or country of residence.
However, the word can also refer to people of French descent who are found in other countries, with significant French-speaking population groups or not, such as Argentina (French Argentines), Brazil (French Brazilians), French West Indies (the French Caribbean people), Canada (French Canadians) and the United States (French Americans), and some of them have a French cultural identity. The United Kingdom also has a large French population, mainly in England, and due to historic relations and immigration.
To be French, according to the first article of the Constitution, is to be a citizen of France, regardless of one's origin, race, or religion (sans distinction d'origine, de race ou de religion). According to its principles, France has devoted herself to the destiny of a proposition nation, a generic territory where people are bounded only by the French language and the assumed willingness to live together, as defined by Ernest Renan's "plébiscite de tous les jours" ("daily referendum" on the willingness to live together, in Renan's 1882 essay "Qu'est-ce qu'une nation?").
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John Byron
Vice Admiral The Hon. John Byron, RN (8 November 1723 – 10 April 1786) was a Royal Navy officer. He was known as Foul-weather Jack because of his frequent bad luck with weather.
Byron was the son of William Byron, 4th Baron Byron and Frances Berkeley. He joined the navy in 1731, accompanying George Anson on his circumnavigation as a midshipman. On 14 May 1741, Byron's ship, HMS Wager, was shipwrecked on the coast of Patagonia, and the survivors decided to split in two teams, one to make its way by boat to Rio de Janeiro, the other, John Byron's, to sail North and meet Spaniards. He described his adventures and the Wager Mutiny in The Narrative of the Honourable John Byron (1768), which sold well enough to appear in several editions. These experiences form the basis of the novel The Unknown Shore by Patrick O'Brian, which closely follows Byron's own account.
Byron was commissioned captain of HMS Siren in December 1746.
In 1760 he was in command of a squadron sent to destroy the fortifications at Louisbourg, which had been captured by the British two years before. In July of that year he defeated the French flotilla sent to relieve New France at the Battle of Restigouche.
wn.com/John_Byron -
John Key
John Phillip Key (born 9 August 1961) is the 38th Prime Minister of New Zealand, in office since 2008. He has led the New Zealand National Party since 2006.
Born in Auckland before moving to Christchurch when he was a child, Key attended the University of Canterbury and graduated in 1981 with a bachelor of commerce, also later undertaking management studies at Harvard University in Boston. He began a career in the foreign exchange market in New Zealand before moving overseas to work for Merrill Lynch, in which he became head of global foreign exchange in 1995, a position he would hold for six years. In 1999 he was appointed a member of the Foreign Exchange Committee of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York until leaving in 2001.
Key entered the New Zealand Parliament representing the Auckland electorate of Helensville as one of the few new National members of parliament in the election of 2002 following National's significant defeat of that year. He has held the seat since then. In 2004, he was appointed Finance Spokesman for National and eventually succeeded Don Brash as the National Party leader in 2006. After two years as Leader of the Opposition, Key led his party to victory in both the November 2008 and the November 2011 general elections.
wn.com/John_Key -
Jonathan Kings
Jonathan Kings is the Administrator of Tokelau since 2011.
wn.com/Jonathan_Kings -
Nathaniel Bowditch
Nathaniel Bowditch (/ˈbaʊdɪtʃ/; March 26, 1773 – March 16, 1838) was an early American mathematician remembered for his work on ocean navigation. He is often credited as the founder of modern maritime navigation; his book The New American Practical Navigator, first published in 1802, is still carried on board every commissioned U.S. Naval vessel.
Nathaniel Bowditch, the fourth of seven children, was born in Salem, Massachusetts to Habakku Bowditch and Mary (Ingersoll) Bowditch. At the age of ten, he was made to leave school to work in his father's cooperage, before becoming indentured at twelve for nine years as a bookkeeping apprentice to a ship chandler.
In 1787, aged fourteen, Bowditch began to study algebra and two years later he taught himself calculus. He also taught himself Latin in 1790 and French in 1792 so he was able to read mathematical works such as Isaac Newton's Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica. He found thousands of errors in John Hamilton Moore's The New Practical Navigator; at eighteen, he copied all the mathematical papers he found in the Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Among his many significant scientific contributions would be a translation of Pierre-Simon de Laplace's Mécanique céleste, a lengthy work on mathematics and theoretical astronomy.
wn.com/Nathaniel_Bowditch -
Orange River Colony
The Orange River Colony was the British colony created after this nation first occupied (1900) and then annexed (1902) the independent Orange Free State in the Second Boer War. The colony ceased to exist in 1910, when it was absorbed into the Union of South Africa as Orange Free State Province.
During the Second Boer War the British forces entered the territory of the Orange Free State and occupied the capital Bloemfontein on 13 March 1900. Five months later, on 6 October 1900 the British government declared an official annexation of the full territory of the Orange Free State, despite the fact that the British had not yet occupied the full territory of the state, nor defeated the Free State forces.
The Orange Free State government had moved to Kroonstad during the first months of the war and would subsequently convene in the field until the end of the war. From the perspective of the Orange Free State, independence was only lost with the ratification of the Treaty of Vereeniging on 31 May 1902.
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Portuguese people
The Portuguese (Portuguese: os Portugueses) are a nation and ethnic group native to the country of Portugal, in the west of the Iberian peninsula of south-west Europe. Their language is Portuguese, and Roman Catholicism is the predominant religion.
Due to the large historical extent of the Portuguese Empire and the colonization of territories in Africa, Asia and the Americas, as well as historical and recent emigration, Portuguese communities can be found in many diverse regions around the globe, and a large Portuguese diaspora exists.
The Portuguese are a southwestern European population, with origins predominantly from Atlantic Europe, Western Europe and the Western Mediterranean.
The earliest modern humans inhabiting Portugal are believed to have been Paleolithic peoples that may have arrived in the Iberian Peninsula as early as 35,000 to 40,000 years ago. Current interpretation of Y-chromosome and mtDNA data suggests that modern-day Portuguese traces largely a significant amount of these lineages to the paleolithic peoples which began arriving to the European continent between the end of the last glaciation around 45,000 years ago.
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Scottish people
The Scottish people (Scots Gaelic: Albannaich), or Scots, are a nation and ethnic group native to Scotland. Historically they emerged from an amalgamation of the Picts and Gaels, incorporating neighbouring Britons to the south as well as invading Germanic peoples such as the Anglo-Saxons and the Norse. Later the Normans also had some influence.
In modern use, "Scottish people" or "Scots" is used to refer to anyone whose linguistic, cultural, family ancestral or genetic origins are from within Scotland. The Latin word Scotti originally applied to a particular, 5th century, Goidelic tribe that inhabited Ireland. Though sometimes considered archaic or pejorative, the term Scotch has also been used for the Scottish people, though this usage is current primarily outside Scotland.
There are people of Scottish descent in many countries other than Scotland. Emigration, influenced by factors such as the Highland and Lowland Clearances, Scottish participation in the British Empire, and latterly industrial decline and unemployment, resulted in Scottish people being found throughout the world. Large populations of Scottish people settled the new-world lands of North and South America, Australia and New Zealand. There is a Scottish presence at a particularly high rate in Canada, which has the second largest population of descended Scots ancestry, after the United States. They took with them their Scottish languages and culture.
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Violina Linda Pedro
Violina Linda Pedro (* 1951 or 1952) is a bowls player from Tokelau.
Violina Pedro started to play lawn bowls in 1989. Lawn Bowls is a very popular sports in the South Pacific region. Whilst the 13th South Pacific Games on Samoa in 2007 she won the first gold medal ever in an international competition for her home country of Tokelau, as she won the Women's Pairs competition with her partner Opetera Samakia Ngatoko. Following she won also a gold medal in Women's Singles.
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2012-06-23 - ONE NEWS - TOKELAU TO BE ENTIRELY SOLAR POWERED
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:07
- Updated: 16 Dec 2012
Tokelau to be entirely solar powered (1.45) Added: 6.48PM Saturday June 23, 2012 Source: ONE News Tokelau is about to become the first country in the world to be entirely powered by solar energy. SOURCE: tvnz.co.nz
http://wn.com/2012-06-23_ONE_NEWS_TOKELAU_TO_BE_ENTIRELY_SOLAR_POWERED
Tokelau to be entirely solar powered (1.45) Added: 6.48PM Saturday June 23, 2012 Source: ONE News Tokelau is about to become the first country in the world to be entirely powered by solar energy. SOURCE: tvnz.co.nz
Tokelau Ceremonial Dance.mp4
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 10:38
- Updated: 31 Dec 2012
Performed at a wedding on the Gold Coast. The dances are traditional ceremonial pieces stitched together for the wedding. Not is known about Tokelau, in fact going to the wedding was the first time I have ever heard of this Island nation. I have monetized this piece for the sole purpose of raising money to produce a film on the island, so please view this and enjoy it many times. I tried to capture the pieces in one shot so I didn't have to do ant editing. My aim was to keep it in one complete piece in case some one needed it for a study. Shot a canon 7D, using the on board mic for sound. Please send this link to as many people as possible, in think more needs to be known about Tokelau.
http://wn.com/Tokelau_Ceremonial_Dancemp4
Performed at a wedding on the Gold Coast. The dances are traditional ceremonial pieces stitched together for the wedding. Not is known about Tokelau, in fact going to the wedding was the first time I have ever heard of this Island nation. I have monetized this piece for the sole purpose of raising money to produce a film on the island, so please view this and enjoy it many times. I tried to capture the pieces in one shot so I didn't have to do ant editing. My aim was to keep it in one complete piece in case some one needed it for a study. Shot a canon 7D, using the on board mic for sound. Please send this link to as many people as possible, in think more needs to be known about Tokelau.
- published: 08 Nov 2012
- views: 650
- author: myvideocassette
Rebuilding Tokelau
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 4:28
- Updated: 09 Nov 2012
While the isolated islands of Tokelau struggle with a dwindling population some of its people are relocating back from New Zealand in a bid to help their nation The challenges they face are not easy but it's about making a difference
http://wn.com/Rebuilding_Tokelau
While the isolated islands of Tokelau struggle with a dwindling population some of its people are relocating back from New Zealand in a bid to help their nation The challenges they face are not easy but it's about making a difference
- published: 03 Aug 2012
- views: 1500
- author: tagatapasifika1
Tokelau: Living by The Sun. Part One.
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 9:01
- Updated: 31 Dec 2012
The first of three short films showing the conversion of the nation of Tokelau into the first country in the World to generate all of its electricity via solar power.
http://wn.com/Tokelau_Living_by_The_Sun_Part_One
The first of three short films showing the conversion of the nation of Tokelau into the first country in the World to generate all of its electricity via solar power.
- published: 28 Jun 2011
- views: 6966
- author: allthetime3000
Tokelau Language Week
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:52
- Updated: 01 Dec 2012
Celebrating Tokelau Language Week 2012 and this year's theme is 'Ke mau ki pale o Tokelau -- Hold fast to your treasures of Tokelau'. Susana Talagi Guttenbeil was in Wellington for the celebrations
http://wn.com/Tokelau_Language_Week
Celebrating Tokelau Language Week 2012 and this year's theme is 'Ke mau ki pale o Tokelau -- Hold fast to your treasures of Tokelau'. Susana Talagi Guttenbeil was in Wellington for the celebrations
- published: 02 Nov 2012
- views: 736
- author: tagatapasifika1
Tokelau-1
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 11:00
- Updated: 28 Nov 2012
Tokelau is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1400. The atolls lie north of the Samoan Islands, east of Tuvalu, south of the Phoenix Islands, southwest of the more distant Line Islands (both island groups belonging to Kiribati) and northwest of the Cook Islands. The United Nations General Assembly designated Tokelau a Non-Self-Governing Territory.Until 1976 the official name was Tokelau Islands. Tokelau is sometimes referred to by the older, colonial name of The Union Islands.
http://wn.com/Tokelau-1
Tokelau is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1400. The atolls lie north of the Samoan Islands, east of Tuvalu, south of the Phoenix Islands, southwest of the more distant Line Islands (both island groups belonging to Kiribati) and northwest of the Cook Islands. The United Nations General Assembly designated Tokelau a Non-Self-Governing Territory.Until 1976 the official name was Tokelau Islands. Tokelau is sometimes referred to by the older, colonial name of The Union Islands.
- published: 20 Oct 2011
- views: 5192
- author: Alexey Bekmuratov
Tokelau Walks the Talk
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 5:04
- Updated: 19 Nov 2012
In December this year, the South Pacific archipelago of Tokelau will be the first nation to be entirely powered by renewable energy: interview with the leader of the delegation that represented Tokelau at the 11th Festival of Pacific Arts this year. www.erenlai.com
http://wn.com/Tokelau_Walks_the_Talk
In December this year, the South Pacific archipelago of Tokelau will be the first nation to be entirely powered by renewable energy: interview with the leader of the delegation that represented Tokelau at the 11th Festival of Pacific Arts this year. www.erenlai.com
- published: 26 Oct 2012
- views: 454
- author: eRENLAI
PACIFIC CRUISE (1951) [Cook Islands and Tokelau]
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 17:00
- Updated: 12 Dec 2012
The story of a Royal New Zealand Navy ship's cruise among New Zealand's Island Territories in the Pacificn namely the Northern and Southern Cook Islands and Tokelau. Native sports and dances, the administration services, and the present day life of the Islands' people. B&W; 18 mins. 35mm 1637 ft. DV file of Beta SP telecini of 35mm film.
http://wn.com/PACIFIC_CRUISE_1951_Cook_Islands_and_Tokelau_
The story of a Royal New Zealand Navy ship's cruise among New Zealand's Island Territories in the Pacificn namely the Northern and Southern Cook Islands and Tokelau. Native sports and dances, the administration services, and the present day life of the Islands' people. B&W; 18 mins. 35mm 1637 ft. DV file of Beta SP telecini of 35mm film.
- published: 21 May 2012
- views: 902
- author: archivesnz
Tokelau Fatele. Nonu'12 Highlight1.wmv
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 9:48
- Updated: 09 Dec 2012
Nukunonu community in Wellington NZ annual gathering 21-Jan-12. Fatele dancing between Egelani and Amelika.
http://wn.com/Tokelau_Fatele_Nonu'12_Highlight1wmv
Nukunonu community in Wellington NZ annual gathering 21-Jan-12. Fatele dancing between Egelani and Amelika.
- published: 06 Feb 2012
- views: 5707
- author: HeuMataOne
When Did People Find Tokelau
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:19
- Updated: 03 Dec 2012
Visit: webtravelmap.com Hello You Tube users! Thank you for watching this video! --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- *Description* The video speaks for itself Enjoy! About Tokelau: Like any other country, Tokelau has a unique sights which makes this country unique travel destination in the world! We sincerely hope this wonderful video will help people to recognize beauty of this country and encourage them to explore as much as possible. Selecting and watching this video is just beginning of your journey. For more information on tourism and travel in Tokelau, you can visit our Tokelau web page: www.webtravelmap.com --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- *Disclaimer* We do not own this video, it is posted only for promotion and presentation of the country and all rights belong to their respective owners. Thank you for reading this.
http://wn.com/When_Did_People_Find_Tokelau
Visit: webtravelmap.com Hello You Tube users! Thank you for watching this video! --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- *Description* The video speaks for itself Enjoy! About Tokelau: Like any other country, Tokelau has a unique sights which makes this country unique travel destination in the world! We sincerely hope this wonderful video will help people to recognize beauty of this country and encourage them to explore as much as possible. Selecting and watching this video is just beginning of your journey. For more information on tourism and travel in Tokelau, you can visit our Tokelau web page: www.webtravelmap.com --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- *Disclaimer* We do not own this video, it is posted only for promotion and presentation of the country and all rights belong to their respective owners. Thank you for reading this.
- published: 17 May 2012
- views: 1090
- author: TokelauWTM
18August 2012 Opening Tokelau song Girls .AVI
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 5:10
- Updated: 16 Sep 2012
sing dance hiva
http://wn.com/18August_2012_Opening_Tokelau_song_Girls_AVI
Tokelau: Still Afloat on the High Seas (part 1)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 10:05
- Updated: 15 Oct 2012
Scoop Documentary: For the people inhabiting Tokelau - one of the most remote and beautiful islands of the Pacific -- their want, their determination, is to be a living breathing example of climate change adaptation rather than become a case-study of catastrophe. Produced by Selwyn Manning.
http://wn.com/Tokelau_Still_Afloat_on_the_High_Seas_part_1
Scoop Documentary: For the people inhabiting Tokelau - one of the most remote and beautiful islands of the Pacific -- their want, their determination, is to be a living breathing example of climate change adaptation rather than become a case-study of catastrophe. Produced by Selwyn Manning.
- published: 18 Feb 2008
- views: 12008
- author: scoopauckland
Tokelau International Festival Rugby League Finals Photo Montage.wmv
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 5:20
- Updated: 19 Nov 2012
A selection of photos from the League Finals.Tatou toe fetaui 2014 in Rotorua!! Photos and Montage produced by Hei Perez.
http://wn.com/Tokelau_International_Festival_Rugby_League_Finals_Photo_Montagewmv
A selection of photos from the League Finals.Tatou toe fetaui 2014 in Rotorua!! Photos and Montage produced by Hei Perez.
- published: 31 May 2012
- views: 1012
- author: Heiu2
Tokelau community is keeping traditional knowledge alive by building a vaka from scratch
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:40
- Updated: 19 Oct 2012
Tokelau community is keeping traditional knowledge alive by building a vaka from scratch Tagata Pasifika TVNZ 17 May 2012
http://wn.com/Tokelau_community_is_keeping_traditional_knowledge_alive_by_building_a_vaka_from_scratch
Tokelau community is keeping traditional knowledge alive by building a vaka from scratch Tagata Pasifika TVNZ 17 May 2012
- published: 17 May 2012
- views: 1626
- author: tagatapasifika1
Small silver unboxing and 2013 Tokelau Lunar snake review
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:00
- Updated: 29 Dec 2012
I picked up a new silver bullion coin that I thought was pretty unusual, and let you see it for the first time, as I see it.
http://wn.com/Small_silver_unboxing_and_2013_Tokelau_Lunar_snake_review
I picked up a new silver bullion coin that I thought was pretty unusual, and let you see it for the first time, as I see it.
- published: 02 Dec 2012
- views: 320
- author: silverfish VT
One Direction Tokelau - One Thing
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:10
- Updated: 16 Dec 2012
WE DO NOT OWN THIS SONG!!! Just a muck around video taken the night after Aunty Alaisa's burial. Bored moments haha. ENJOY ! lol
http://wn.com/One_Direction_Tokelau_One_Thing
WE DO NOT OWN THIS SONG!!! Just a muck around video taken the night after Aunty Alaisa's burial. Bored moments haha. ENJOY ! lol
- published: 20 Sep 2012
- views: 559
- author: Nessa Tagaloa
Tokelau: un paradiso "green"
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:23
- Updated: 31 Aug 2012
3 bellissimi atolli nel Pacifico si avviano a diventare completamente dipendenti dall'energia solare. guarda il video originale su classmeteo.weather.com
http://wn.com/Tokelau_un_paradiso_green
3 bellissimi atolli nel Pacifico si avviano a diventare completamente dipendenti dall'energia solare. guarda il video originale su classmeteo.weather.com
- published: 08 Aug 2012
- views: 320
- author: ClassMeteo
Journey to Tokelau
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 4:20
- Updated: 21 Oct 2012
Journey to Tokelau Islands
http://wn.com/Journey_to_Tokelau
Tokelau-2
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 10:56
- Updated: 11 Sep 2012
Tokelau is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1400. The atolls lie north of the Samoan Islands, east of Tuvalu, south of the Phoenix Islands, southwest of the more distant Line Islands (both island groups belonging to Kiribati) and northwest of the Cook Islands. The United Nations General Assembly designated Tokelau a Non-Self-Governing Territory.Until 1976 the official name was Tokelau Islands. Tokelau is sometimes referred to by the older, colonial name of The Union Islands.
http://wn.com/Tokelau-2
Tokelau is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1400. The atolls lie north of the Samoan Islands, east of Tuvalu, south of the Phoenix Islands, southwest of the more distant Line Islands (both island groups belonging to Kiribati) and northwest of the Cook Islands. The United Nations General Assembly designated Tokelau a Non-Self-Governing Territory.Until 1976 the official name was Tokelau Islands. Tokelau is sometimes referred to by the older, colonial name of The Union Islands.
- published: 20 Oct 2011
- views: 2165
- author: Alexey Bekmuratov
Beautiful Tokelau 2011...(Last Days)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 6:11
- Updated: 15 Oct 2012
HAGO ent
http://wn.com/Beautiful_Tokelau_2011Last_Days
Tokelau celebrations in Wellington
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:39
- Updated: 16 Nov 2012
Ki te Whanganui-a-Tara, i tu te taiopenga a te iwi o Tokelau i nga rangi e toru nei.
http://wn.com/Tokelau_celebrations_in_Wellington
Ki te Whanganui-a-Tara, i tu te taiopenga a te iwi o Tokelau i nga rangi e toru nei.
- published: 09 Apr 2012
- views: 2667
- author: tekareremaorinews
ZK3SB - 2004 DXPEDITION TO TOKELAU ISLAND
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 4:05
- Updated: 11 Jul 2012
TOKELAU ISLAND DXPEDITION FROM ZK3SB I2YSB IK2DIA I2MOV IK1AOD
http://wn.com/ZK3SB_2004_DXPEDITION_TO_TOKELAU_ISLAND
TOKELAU ISLAND DXPEDITION FROM ZK3SB I2YSB IK2DIA I2MOV IK1AOD
- published: 17 Sep 2009
- views: 3212
- author: nababalao
Tokelau filmed, NZRL 2006 U18sOrcasVsNthlnd 'That Try!!!'.wmv
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 7:58
- Updated: 17 Nov 2012
'That Try!!" ft.Ben Matulino, Mose Masoe, Alehana Mara, Ashley Parker and others now playing in the NRL & NPC comps. Head Coach: Paul Bergman. Assists: Ivan Harrison & Mas Patelesio. Managers: Peter Mellars & Sam Sakaria
http://wn.com/Tokelau_filmed,_NZRL_2006_U18sOrcasVsNthlnd_'That_Try!!!'wmv
'That Try!!" ft.Ben Matulino, Mose Masoe, Alehana Mara, Ashley Parker and others now playing in the NRL & NPC comps. Head Coach: Paul Bergman. Assists: Ivan Harrison & Mas Patelesio. Managers: Peter Mellars & Sam Sakaria
- published: 26 Feb 2011
- views: 6355
- author: HeuMataOne
photo: AP / New York City Police Department
30 Dec 2012
A woman who told police she shoved a man to his death off a subway platform because she has hated Muslims since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the US and thought he was one was charged on Saturday with murder as a hate crime, prosecutors said ... Menendez, 31, was awaiting arraignment on the charge on Saturday evening, Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said. She faces 25 years to life in prison if convicted ... On Dec ... ....(size: 3.0Kb)
photo: AP / Altaf Qadri
29 Dec 2012
Police in India have sealed off much of the capital, Delhi, and issued an appeal for calm after the death of a woman who was gang-raped in the city. The 23-year old woman, who has not been identified, died early on Saturday at a hospital in Singapore, where she had been taken for specialist treatment. Her body is to be flown back to India for burial ... Gatherings of more than five people have been banned in the city centre ... ....(size: 4.9Kb)
photo: AP / Shaam News Network
30 Dec 2012
London. UN-Arab League envoy to Damascus, Lakhdar Brahimi, has said that a diplomatic solution to the conflict in Syria seemed far away, adding that the country risked being slithering into ‘hell’ ... (ANI). For Zee News’s Updates, follow us on Twitter , Facebook, Google+, Pinterest. First Published ... ....(size: 1.7Kb)
photo: WN / Bhaskar Mallick
30 Dec 2012
Comet Ison is likely to light up the skies in 2013. David Shukman, science editor, BBC News Continue reading the main story Related Stories. A science news preview of 2012. As the Philippines, New Jersey and Britain count the cost of ferocious flooding, expect another year in which extreme weather exacts a human toll. Partly this is because more and more of us live in harm's way on coasts and flood plains ... ....(size: 9.2Kb)
photo: AP / John MacDougall
31 Dec 2012
Chancellor Angela Merkel has warned that the German economic climate in 2013 will be "even more difficult". In her new year message, she also cautioned that the eurozone debt crisis was far from over. However, she did say that reforms designed to address the roots of the problem were beginning to bear fruit ... In a taped interview to be broadcast later on Monday, Mrs Merkel urged Germans to be more patient ... Voters 'wary' ... ....(size: 2.3Kb)
Newsday
31 Dec 2012
... Tanzania, United Republic Of Thailand Timor-Leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad And Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks And Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States United States Minor Outlying Islands Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela Viet Nam Virgin Islands, British Virgin Islands, U.S....(size: 6.2Kb)
Stuff
29 Dec 2012
The film 'Life of Pi' is fiction, but the last line is true ... In real life, it's Pacific Islanders who make for castaway tales - complete with the tiger sharks ... In 2010, three teenagers on Tokelau's Atafu Atoll had an alcohol-fuelled dare to sail to Fakaofo, 800km away to see a girl, Anita Iasona ... But there were many sceptics among Tokelau's 1200 people over what happened, although the boys did look gaunt and hungry when rescued ... ....(size: 5.6Kb)
MSNBC
27 Dec 2012
NEW YORK — A Florida fossil dealer pleaded guilty to smuggling charges Thursday and agreed to give up a celebrated $1 million dinosaur skeleton that was seized by the U.S. government earlier this year for eventual return to Mongolia ... No ... 9 ... 8 ... Hannah Johnston / Getty Images Samoa and New Zealand-administered Tokelau skip a day as they jump over the international date line in an attempt to improve trade and tourism ... ....(size: 16.8Kb)
Richmond Times Dispatch
24 Dec 2012
French Polynesia — a group of five major archipelagoes with more than 100 islands, including Tahiti — created the world’s largest shark sanctuary of 1.5 million square miles of sea on Dec. 6 ... Before French Polynesia’s declaration, six countries — Palau, Maldives, Honduras, Bahamas, Marshall Islands and Tokelau — had created shark sanctuaries. ....(size: 1.6Kb)
Newsday
24 Dec 2012
... Tanzania, United Republic Of Thailand Timor-Leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad And Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks And Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States United States Minor Outlying Islands Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela Viet Nam Virgin Islands, British Virgin Islands, U.S....(size: 6.4Kb)
San Francisco Chronicle
18 Dec 2012
French Polynesia - a group of five major archipelagoes with more than 100 islands, including Tahiti - created the world's largest shark sanctuary of 1.5 million square miles of sea on Dec. 6 ... 19 ... Before French Polynesia's declaration, six countries - Palau, Maldives, Honduras, Bahamas, Marshall Islands and Tokelau - had created shark sanctuaries. ....(size: 1.5Kb)
Seattle Times
18 Dec 2012
French Polynesia and the Cook Islands this month created adjacent shark sanctuaries spanning 2.5 million square miles of ocean, a move that reflects a growing trend to protect sharks worldwide and more than doubles the area now off-limits to any shark fishing ... 6 ... 19 ... ... Before French Polynesia’s declaration, six countries — Palau, Maldives, Honduras, Bahamas, Marshall Islands and Tokelau — had created shark sanctuaries....(size: 3.4Kb)
MSNBC
18 Dec 2012
What if everything — all of us, the world, the universe — was not real? What if everything we are, know and do was really just someone's computer simulation? ... But some physicists now think they know of a way to test the concept ... The Matrix hypothesis ... 9 ... Hannah Johnston / Getty Images Samoa and New Zealand-administered Tokelau skip a day as they jump over the international date line in an attempt to improve trade and tourism....(size: 20.0Kb)
Scoop
15 Dec 2012
Saturday, 15 December 2012, 1.23 pm. Press Release. PICI. Cook Islands Create World’s Largest Safe Haven for Sharks. Today (Wed. 12 Dec), the Cook Islands declared the entire 1.997 million sq. km (771,000 sq ... The Cook Islands and French Polynesia’s combined 6.7 million sq. km (954,000 sq. mile) EEZs now connect with those of American Samoa and Tokelau to create the largest contiguous shark protection area in the world ... The U.S ... ....(size: 5.0Kb)
Newsday
14 Dec 2012
... Tanzania, United Republic Of Thailand Timor-Leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad And Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks And Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States United States Minor Outlying Islands Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela Viet Nam Virgin Islands, British Virgin Islands, U.S....(size: 11.4Kb)
The Washington Post
14 Dec 2012
French Polynesia and the Cook Islands this month created adjacent shark sanctuaries spanning 2.5 million square miles of ocean, a move that reflects a growing trend to protect sharks worldwide and more than doubles the area now off-limits to any shark fishing ... 6 ... 19 ... Before French Polynesia’s declaration, six countries — Palau, Maldives, Honduras, Bahamas, Marshall Islands and Tokelau — had created shark sanctuaries. ....(size: 5.3Kb)
Newsday
14 Dec 2012
... Tanzania, United Republic Of Thailand Timor-Leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad And Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks And Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States United States Minor Outlying Islands Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela Viet Nam Virgin Islands, British Virgin Islands, U.S....(size: 6.7Kb)
BBC News
13 Dec 2012
The Cook Islands has approved a shark sanctuary in its waters, making for the largest such sanctuary in the world. The South Pacific island chain declared a 1.9 million-sq-km sanctuary, contiguous with one established last week by neighbouring French Polynesia ... Other island nations with sanctuaries also include Palau, the Maldives, Tokelau, Honduras and the Bahamas ... ....(size: 2.1Kb)
For other uses, see Tokelau (disambiguation).
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Tokelau
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| Motto: "Tokelau mo te Atua" (Tokelauan) "Tokelau for the Almighty" |
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| Anthem: God Save The Queen |
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.svg) |
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| Capital | Nukunonu (main settlement, although each atoll has its own administrative centre.) | |||||
| Largest city | Nukunonu (Officially) | |||||
| Official language(s) | Tokelauan,[1] English | |||||
| Demonym | Tokelauan | |||||
| Government | Constitutional monarchy | |||||
| - | Head of State | Queen Elizabeth II | ||||
| - | Administrator | Jonathan Kings (February 2011-) | ||||
| - | Head of Government | Keli Hiano Kalolo (2012-) | ||||
| New Zealand territory | ||||||
| - | Tokelau Act | 1948 | ||||
| Area | ||||||
| - | Total | 10 km2 (233rd) 5 sq mi |
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| - | Water (%) | negligible | ||||
| Population | ||||||
| - | October 2011 census | 1,4111 (237th) | ||||
| - | Density | 115/km2 (86th) 298/sq mi |
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| GDP (PPP) | 1993 estimate | |||||
| - | Total | $1.5 million (227th) | ||||
| - | Per capita | $1,035 (not ranked) | ||||
| Currency | New Zealand dollar (NZD) |
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| Time zone | (UTC+14) | |||||
| Drives on the | left | |||||
| ISO 3166 code | TK | |||||
| Internet TLD | .tk | |||||
| Calling code | 690 | |||||
| Some data from the World Factbook (2004). 1. Final count for 2011 Tokelau Census of Population and Dwellings, Statistics New Zealand. The Census population figure of 1,411 includes 268 usual residents of Tokelau who were absent on census night. |
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Tokelau ( /ˈtoʊkəlaʊ/) is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1,400. [2] The atolls lie north of the Samoan Islands, east of Tuvalu, south of the Phoenix Islands, southwest of the more distant Line Islands (both island groups belonging to Kiribati) and northwest of the Cook Islands.
The United Nations General Assembly designated Tokelau a Non-Self-Governing Territory.[3] Until 1976 the official name was Tokelau Islands. Tokelau is sometimes referred to by the older, colonial name of The Union Islands.
Contents |
Etymology and consequences of name usage[link]
The name Tokelau is a Polynesian word meaning "North Wind". The islands were named the Union Islands and Union Group by European explorers at an unknown time. Tokelau Islands was adopted as the name in 1946, and was contracted to Tokelau on 9 December 1976.
The change from Tokelau Islands to Tokelau marked a slight shift in emphasis, with consequences in regional diplomacy, in that the term Tokelau Islands clearly and substantially referred to a geographical expression, that is, a range of islands, whatever else it may connote. It is not necessarily controversial to refer by name to a range of islands, even though they may come under two or more political jurisdictions. Tokelau, on the other hand, can be taken to refer more immediately to some concept of nationhood, arguably infusing increased meaning to the draft 2006 independence constitution of Tokelau (which somewhat controversially claims Tokelauan inhabited Olohega (or Swains Island), currently part of American Samoa, as part of its national territory).[citation needed]
Geography[link]
Tokelau includes three atolls in the South Pacific Ocean between longitudes 171° and 173° W and between latitudes 8° and 10° S, about midway between Hawaii and New Zealand. They lie about 500 km (311 mi) north of Samoa. The atolls are Atafu, Nukunonu, both in a group of islands once called the Duke of Clarence Group, and Fakaofo, once Bowditch Island. Their combined land area is 10.8 km². There are no ports or harbours. Tokelau lies in the Pacific typhoon belt. A fourth island that is culturally, historically, and geographically, but not politically, part of the Tokelau chain is Swains Island (Olohega), under United States control since about 1900 and administered as part of American Samoa since 1925.
Swains Island was claimed by the United States pursuant to the Guano Islands Act, as were the other three islands of Tokelau, which claims were ceded to Tokelau by treaty in 1979. In the draft constitution of Tokelau subject to the Tokelauan self-determination referendum in 2006, Olohega is claimed as part of Tokelau, a claim surrendered in the same 1979 treaty which established a boundary between American Samoa and Tokelau.
Tokelau's claim to Swains is generally comparable to the Marshall Islands' claim to US-administered Wake Island, but the re-emergence of this somewhat dormant issue has been an unintended result of the United Nations' recent efforts to promote decolonization in Tokelau. Tokelauans have proved somewhat reluctant to push their national identity in the political realm: recent decolonization moves have mainly been driven from outside for ideological reasons. But at the same time, Tokelauans are reluctant to disown their common cultural identity with Swains Islanders who speak their language.
Environment[link]
See also: List of birds of Tokelau and List of mammals of Tokelau
Tokelau is located in the Western Polynesian tropical moist forests ecoregion. Most of the original vegetation has been replaced by coconut plantations some of which have been abandoned and became scrubby forests. The atolls of Tokelau provide habitat for 38 indigenous plant species, over 150 insect species and 10 land crab species. One of the greatest threats to biodiversity is posed by introduced mammalian predators such as the Polynesian Rat.[4]
In 2011 Tokelau declared its entire exclusive economic zone of 319,031 km² a shark sanctuary.[5]
History[link]
Archaeological evidence indicates that the atolls of Tokelau — Atafu, Nukunonu, and Fakaofo — were settled about 1,000 years ago and may have been a "nexus" into Eastern Polynesia.[6] Inhabitants followed Polynesian mythology with the local god Tui Tokelau; and developed forms of music (see Music of Tokelau) and art. The three atolls functioned largely independently while maintaining social and linguistic cohesion. Tokelauan society was governed by chiefly clans, and there were occasional inter-atoll skirmishes and wars as well as inter-marriage. Fakaofo, the "chiefly island",[7] held some dominance over Atafu and Nukunonu after the dispersal of Atafu. Life on the atolls was subsistence-based, with reliance on fish and coconut.[8]
Western discovery and contact[link]
Commodore John Byron discovered Atafu on 24 June 1765 and named it "Duke of York's Island". Parties onshore reported that there were no signs of current or previous inhabitants.[9][10] Captain Edward Edwards, in knowledge of Byron's discovery, visited Atafu on 6 June 1791[citation needed] in search of the Bounty mutineers. There were no permanent inhabitants, but houses contained canoes and fishing gear, suggesting the island was used as a temporary residence by fishing parties.[10] On 12 June 1791, Edwards sailed southward and discovered Nukunonu, naming it "Duke of Clarence's Island".[11] A landing party could not make contact with the people but saw "morais", burying places, and canoes with "stages in their middle" sailing across the lagoons.[10]
On 29 October 1825 August R. Strong of the U.S.N Dolphin wrote of his crew's arrival at the atoll Nukunonu, "Upon examination, we found they had removed all the women and children from the settlement, which was quite small, and put them in canoes lying off a rock in the lagoon. They would frequently come near the shore, but when we approached they would pull off with great noise and precipitation." (The Journal of the South Pacific, 110 (3), pp. 296).
On 14 February 1835 Captain Smith of the United States whaler General Jackson records discovering Fakaofo, calling it "D'Wolf's Island".[12][13] On 25 January 1841, the United States Exploring Expedition visited Atafu and discovered a small population living on the island. The residents appeared to be temporary, evidenced by the lack of a chief and the possession of double canoes (used for inter-island travel). They desired to barter, and possessed blue beads and a plane-iron, indicating previous interaction with foreigners. The expedition reached Nukunonu on 28 January 1841 but did not record any information about inhabitants. On 29 January 1841, the expedition discovered Fakaofo and named it "Bowditch".[14] The islanders were found to be similar in appearance and nature to those in Atafu.[15]
Missionaries preached Christianity in Tokelau from 1845 to the 1860s. French Catholic missionaries on Wallis Island (also known as 'Uvea) and missionaries of the Protestant London Missionary Society in Samoa used native teachers to convert the Tokelauans. Atafu was converted to Protestantism by the London Missionary Society, Nukunonu was converted to Catholicism and Fakaofo was converted to both denominations.[16]
Peruvian slave traders arrived in 1863 and took nearly all (253) of the able-bodied men to work as labourers. The men died of dysentery and smallpox, and very few returned to Tokelau. With this loss, the system of governance became based on the "Taupulega", or "Councils of Elders", where individual families on each atoll were represented.[8][13] During this time, Polynesian immigrants and American, Scottish, French, Portuguese and German beachcombers settled, marrying local women and repopulating the atolls.[13]
21st Century[link]
Until December 2011, Tokelau was almost a day behind New Zealand, being 10 hours behind Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). [17][18] At midnight 29 December 2011 Tokelau shifted to UTC+14:00 in response to Samoa's decision to do the same. This brought Tokelau closer to New Zealand time (and in the process omitted 30 December).[19]
Government[link]
In 1877 the islands were included under the protection of the United Kingdom by an Order in Council which claimed jurisdiction over all unclaimed Pacific Islands. Commander C. F. Oldham on HMS Egeria landed at each of the three atolls in June 1889[20] and officially raised the Union Flag, declaring the group a British protectorate. In 1920, Tokelauans became recognised as British subjects.[21]
The British government annexed Tokelau to the colony of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands and transferred Tokelau to New Zealand administration in 1926, abolishing the islands' chiefdoms. By the Tokelau Act of 1948, sovereignty over Tokelau was transferred to New Zealand. Defence is also the responsibility of New Zealand. When the British Nationality and New Zealand Citizenship Act 1948 came into effect on 1 January 1949, Tokelauans who were British subjects gained New Zealand citizenship - a status which they still hold today.[21]
At the moment, Tokelauans are drafting a constitution and developing institutions and patterns of self-government as Tokelau moves towards free association with New Zealand, similar to Niue and the Cook Islands.[citation needed]
Villages are entitled to enact their own laws regulating their daily lives and New Zealand law only applies where it has been extended by specific enactment. Serious crime is rare and there are no prisons - offenders are publicly rebuked, fined or made to work.[22]
Politics[link]
Main article: Politics of Tokelau
The head of state is Elizabeth II, the Queen in right of New Zealand, who also reigns over the United Kingdom and the other Commonwealth realms. The Queen is represented in the territory by acting Administrator Jonathan Kings. The current head of government is Foua Toloa, who presides over the Council for the Ongoing Governance of Tokelau, which functions as a cabinet. The Council consists of the Faipule (leader) and Pulenuku (village mayor) of each of the three atolls.[23] The monarch is hereditary, the administrator appointed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade in New Zealand, and the office of head of government rotates between the three Faipule for a one-year term.[23]
The Tokelau Amendment Act of 1996 confers legislative power on the General Fono, a unicameral body. The number of seats each atoll receives in the Fono is determined by population — at present, Fakaofo and Atafu each have seven and Nukunonu has six.[23] Faipule and Pukenuku (atoll leaders and village mayors) also sit in the Fono.[23]
On 11 November 2004, Tokelau and New Zealand took steps to formulate a treaty that would turn Tokelau from a non-self-governing territory to a self-governing state in free association with New Zealand. Besides the treaty, a UN-sponsored referendum on self-determination took place, with the three islands voting on successive days starting 13 February 2006. (Tokelauans based in Apia, Samoa, voted on 11 February.)[24] Out of 581 votes cast, 349 were for Free Association, being short of the two-thirds majority required for the measure to pass.[25] The referendum was profiled (somewhat light-heartedly) in the 1 May 2006 issue of The New Yorker magazine.[26] A repeat referendum took place on 20–24 October 2007, again narrowly failing to approve self-government. This time the vote was short by just 16 votes or 3%.[27]
In May 2008, the United Nations' Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged colonial powers "to complete the decolonization process in every one of the remaining 16 Non-Self-Governing Territories", including Tokelau.[28] This led the New Zealand Herald to comment that the United Nations was "apparently frustrated by two failed attempts to get Tokelau to vote for independence".[29] In April 2008, speaking as leader of the National Party, future New Zealand Prime Minister John Key stated that New Zealand had "imposed two referenda on the people of the Tokelau Islands", and questioned "the accepted wisdom that small states should undergo a de-colonisation process".[30]
Economy[link]
According to the US Central Intelligence Agency's list of countries by GDP (PPP) Tokelau has the smallest economy of any country in the world. Tokelau has an annual purchasing power of about US$1,000 (€674) per capita. The government is almost entirely dependent on subsidies from New Zealand. It has annual revenues of less than US$500,000 (€336,995) against expenditures of some US$2.8 million (€1.9 million). The deficit is made up by aid from New Zealand.
Tokelau annually exports around US$100,000 (€67,000) of stamps, copra and woven and carved handicrafts and imports over US$300,000 (€202,000) of foodstuffs, building materials, and fuel to, and from, New Zealand. New Zealand also pays directly for the cost of medical and education services. Local industries include small-scale enterprises for copra production, wood work, plaited craft goods, stamps, coins, and fishing. Agriculture and livestock produces coconuts, copra, breadfruit, papayas, bananas, figs, pigs, poultry and few goats. Many Tokelauans live in New Zealand and support their families in Tokelau through remittances.
Tokelau has plans to only use renewable energy. If this is achieved it will be the only nation to have achieved this goal.[31] It is expected that by mid 2012 Tokelau's electricity supply will be 93% generated by photovoltaics, with the remainder generated from coconut oil.[32]
Internet domain names[link]
Main article: .tk
Tokelau has increased its GDP by more than 10% through registrations of domain names under its top-level domain, .tk.[33] Registrations can be either free, in which case the user owns only usage rights and not the domain itself, or paid, which grants full rights. Free domains are pointed to Tokelau name servers, which redirects the domain via HTML frames to a specified address or to a specified A or NS record, and the redirection of up to 250 email addresses to an external address (not at a .tk domain). Free domains have no requirements for third party advertisements but have a minimum traffic limit of 25 unique visitors in any 90 day period. If this limit is not reached, the domain is suspended and the owner has either 10 days to convert the domain to a paid domain or have the domain deregistered.[34]
In September 2003 Fakaofo became the first part of Tokelau with a high-speed Internet connection. Foundation Tokelau financed the project. Tokelau gives most domain names under its authority away to anyone for free to gain publicity for the territory. This has allowed the nation to gain enhanced telecommunications technologies, such as more computers and Internet access for Tokelauan residents.[citation needed]
Demographics[link]
According to the 2011 Tokelau Census, Tokelau has a de jure usually resident population of 1,411 people. The census shows a 3.8% decrease in the de jure usually resident population between 2006 and 2011.[35]
The nationals of Tokelau are called Tokelauans, and the major ethnic group is Polynesian. The country has no minorities. The major religion is the Congregational Christian Church and the main language is Tokelauan, but English is also spoken.
Tokelau has fewer than 1,500 Polynesian inhabitants in three villages who speak Tokelauan and English. Their isolation and lack of resources greatly limits economic development and confines agriculture to the subsistence level. The very limited natural resources and overcrowding are contributing to emigration to New Zealand and Samoa, resulting in a population decline of about 0.9% per year.[citation needed] Depletion of tuna has made fishing for food more difficult.
On the island of Atafu almost all inhabitants are members of the Congregational Christian Church of Samoa. On Nukunonu almost all are Roman Catholic. On Fakaofo both denominations are present with the Congregational Christian Church predominant. The total proportions are: Congregational Christian Church 62%, Roman Catholic 34%, other 5%.[36]
While slightly more females than males live on Atafu and Fakaofo, males make up 57% of Nukunonu residents.[37] Only 9% of Tokelauans aged 40 or more have never been married.[38] One quarter of the population were born overseas; almost all the rest live on the same atoll they were born on.[39] Most households own 5 or more pigs.[40]
Despite its low income, Tokelau has a life expectancy of 69 years, comparable with parts of Europe.[41]
Sport[link]
See also: Rugby union in Tokelau and Rugby league in Tokelau
Due to its small size, Tokelau is unaffiliated to most international sports organisations, and rarely takes part in international events. The only significant international competition the country takes part in is the Pacific Games. Tokelau won its first ever gold medals at the 2007 Pacific Games in Apia, winning a total of five medals (three gold, a silver and a bronze), all in lawn bowls, and finishing twelfth (out of twenty-two) on the overall medal table. This included two gold medals for Violina Linda Pedro (in the women's pairs and the women's singles), making her Tokelau's most successful individual athlete to date.[42]
In October 2010, table tennis became "the first sport in Tokelau to be granted membership at a Continental or World level", when the Tokelau Table Tennis Association was formally established and became the 23rd member of the Oceania Table Tennis Federation.[43]
Tokelau was due to take part, for the first time, in the 2010 Commonwealth Games, in Delhi,[44] but, for unknown reasons, ultimately did not do so.[45]
Tokelau does have a National Sports Federation, and the most important sports event within the country is arguably the Tokelau Games, which are held yearly. When they are held, "all of Tokelau virtually stands still", as "[i]n excess of 50% of the population take part and all work and school stops at the time". The 2010 Games included competitions in rugby sevens, netball and kilikiti, alongside "a cultural evening [...] where each atoll showcases their traditional songs and dances".[43]
Netball is thought to have been introduced to Tokelau by the British, but became more popular when New Zealand's government took over the territory. The sport is often played during inter-island sport competitions, alongside other sports like rugby league and volleyball.[46]
Healthcare and education[link]
Main article: Healthcare in Tokelau
Each atoll has a school and hospital. The health services have a Director of Health based in Apia and a Chief Clinical Advisor who moves from atoll to atoll as required to assist the doctors attached to each hospital. In 2007 there was not always a doctor on each island and locums were appointed to fill the gaps. Upcoming Tokelaun medical graduates should alleviate this shortage in the coming years.
Many Tokelauan youth travel to New Zealand to further their education and the ship is full around Christmas time with students returning home and then heading off for another year of study.
Communications and transportation[link]
Tokelau has a radio telephone service between the islands and to Samoa. In 1997, a government-regulated telephone service (TeleTok) with three satellite earth stations was established. Each atoll has a radio-broadcast station that broadcasts shipping and weather reports and every household has a radio or access to one.
Tokelau is served by the MV Tokelau, owned by the country, with the trip from Apia in Samoa taking a little over a day. Ships load and unload cargo by motoring up to the down-wind (leeward) side of the islet where the people live and maintaining station, by intermittent use of engines, close to the reef edge so that a landing barge can be motored out to transfer cargo to or from the shore. On returning to shore, the barge negotiates a narrow channel through the reef to the beach. Usually this landing is subject to ocean swell and beaching requires considerable skill and, often, coral abrasions to bodies.
When bad weather prevents the barge making the trip, the ship stands off to wait suitable weather or goes off to one of the other atolls to attempt to load or unload its passengers or cargo, or both.
There is no airport in Tokelau, so boats are the only means of travel and transport.
Cyclone Percy[link]
Cyclone Percy struck and severely damaged Tokelau in late February and early March 2005. Forecasters underestimated the cyclone's strength and the length of time it would be in vicinity to Tokelau. It coincided with a spring tide which put most of the area of the two villages on Fakaofo and Nukunonu under a metre of seawater. The cyclone also caused major erosion on several islets of all three atolls, damaging roads and bridges and disrupting electric power and telecommunications systems. The cyclone did significant and widespread damage to food crops including bananas, coconuts and pandanus. It did not seriously injure anyone but villagers lost significant amounts of property. The geographic future of Tokelau depends on the height of the ocean. No significant land is more than two metres above high water of ordinary tides. This means Tokelau is particularly vulnerable to any possible sea level rises.
Books and publications[link]
- Tokelau: a historical ethnography by Judith Huntsman & Antony Hooper (1996, Auckland University Press) ISBN 1-86940-153-0
- The Future of Tokelau: decolonising agendas by Judith Huntsman with Kelihiano Kalolo (2007, Auckland University Press) ISBN 978-1-86940-398-0
- Tokelau: People, atolls, and history by Peter McQuarrie (2007, Peter McQuarrie Press) ISBN 978-1-877449-41-3
- Where on Earth is Tokelau? by Dr Maxwell H. Heller (2005) ISBN 0-901100-58-7
See also[link]
References[link]
- ^ "Tokelau Info". Tokelau-info.tk. http://www.tokelau-info.tk/. Retrieved 2011-12-30.
- ^ "Welcome to sunny Tokelau, an untouched Pacific Paradise.". http://www.tokelau.org.nz/.
- ^ "Official site for the Tokelau Council of Ongoing Government". http://www.tokelau.org.nz/. Retrieved 2007-11-04. "The basis of Tokelau's legislative, administrative and judicial systems is the Tokelau Islands Act 1948 and its amendments. (See the link "LAW") In November 1974 the administration of Tokelau was transferred from the Mäori and Island Affairs Department to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. From then until September 1980, when the Tokelau administration regulations were amended, the New Zealand Secretary of Foreign Affairs was the administrator of Tokelau. New regulations then came into force whereby the Minister of Foreign Affairs was empowered to appoint a suitable person to be the Administrator of Tokelau. The New Zealand flag is used and the anthem is God Save the Queen."
- ^ "WWF - WildFinder". Worldwildlife.org. http://www.worldwildlife.org/wildworld/profiles/terrestrial/oc/oc0117_full.html. Retrieved 2012-05-27.
- ^ PEW: Tokelau Declares Shark Sanctuary, 7 September 2011
- ^ "Archeology of Atafu, Tokelau: Some Initial Results 2008". http://researchcommons.waikato.ac.nz//handle/10289/2891. Retrieved 2010-11-12.
- ^ http://www.fakaofo.tk/page001.html
- ^ a b "Tokelau". New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. http://www.mfat.govt.nz/Countries/Pacific/Tokelau.php. Retrieved 2007-09-29.
- ^ John Byron, John Samuel Wallis, Philip Carteret, James Cook, Joseph Banks (1773). An Account of the Voyages Undertaken by the Order of His Present Majesty for making discoveries in the southern hemisphere and successfully performed by Commodore Byron, Captain Carteret, Captain Wallis and Captain Cook in the Dolphin, the Swallow, and the Endeavour. pp. 132–133. http://books.google.com/books?id=8lgBAAAAYAAJ. Retrieved 2007-09-29.
- ^ a b c MacGregor, 30
- ^ Sharp, Andrew (1960). The Discovery of the Pacific Islands. p. 164. http://books.google.com/books?id=HJYhAAAAMAAJ&q=%2212+June%22&pgis=1. Retrieved 2007-09-30.
- ^ Polynesian Society (N. Z.) (1961). The Journal of the Polynesian Society. p. 102. http://books.google.com/books?id=oWQLAAAAIAAJ&q=%22Smith+placed+Fakaofo+correctly%22. Retrieved 2007-09-30.
- ^ a b c "Information Bulletin on Tokelau". New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. http://www.mfat.govt.nz/Foreign-Relations/Pacific/Tokelau/0-tokelaubooklet.php. Retrieved 2007-09-29.
- ^ Nathaniel Bowditch (1773–1838) was an American mathematician remembered for his work on ocean navigation.
- ^ Charles Wilkes (1849). Voyage Round the World. p. 538. http://books.google.com/books?id=NyQcAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA538. Retrieved 2007-09-30.
- ^ People[dead link]
- ^ "Current local time in Fakaofo, Tokelau". http://www.worldtimezone.com/time/wtzresult.php?CiID=42135. Retrieved 2007-12-28.
- ^ "World Time Zones map". Victoria University of Wellington website. http://www.vuw.ac.nz/~caplabtb/m302w07/time_zones.pdf. Retrieved 2007-12-28.
- ^ "Tokelau to join Samoa and leap forward over dateline". BBC News. 6 October 2011. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-15197275. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland (1965). The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland. p. 43. http://books.google.com/books?id=agAaAAAAMAAJ&q=%22June,%201889,%20and%20on%22&dq=oldham+june+1889+egeria&as_brr=0&pgis=1. Retrieved 2007-09-30.
- ^ a b "3. Aliens and citizens - Citizenship - Te Ara Encyclopedia of New Zealand". Teara.govt.nz. 2009-03-04. http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/citizenship/3. Retrieved 2012-05-27.
- ^ "Official site for the Tokelau Council of Ongoing Government". http://www.tokelau.org.nz/. Retrieved 2007-11-04. "The legislation and judicial systems are based on the Tokelau Act, 1948, and its amendments. A major law reform project is continuing; its purpose is to ensure that Tokelau has a coherent body of law which responds to current needs and gives due recognition to local custom. Unless it is expressly extended to Tokelau, New Zealand statute law does not apply to the territory. In practice, no New Zealand legislation is extended to Tokelau without Tokelauan consent. The villages have the statutory power to enact their own laws covering village affairs. International covenants on economic, social and cultural rights and civil and political rights, ratified by New Zealand in December 1978, apply in Tokelau. Civil and criminal jurisdiction is exercised by commissioners and the New Zealand high court."
- ^ a b c d "How Tokelau is Governed". Tokelauan Council of Ongoing Governance. http://www.tokelau.org.nz/Tokelau+Government/Government/HOW+TOKELAU+IS+GOVERNED.html. Retrieved 29 June 2010.
- ^ "Fono decisions". Archived from the original on 2007-08-22. http://web.archive.org/web/20070822073325/http://www.tokelau.org.nz/english/gfdecisions/gfnov05.html. Retrieved 2007-09-29.
- ^ "Tokelau rejects self-rule". Television New Zealand. http://tvnz.co.nz/view/page/411366/661377. Retrieved 2007-09-29.
- ^ Parker, Ian (1 May 2006). "Letter from Polynesia: Birth of a nation?". The New Yorker. http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/05/01/060501fa_fact_parker. Retrieved 2007-09-29.
- ^ "Tokelau stays as NZ's last colony". Television New Zealand. http://tvnz.co.nz/view/page/1318360/1415741. Retrieved 2007-10-25.
- ^ "Colonialism has no place in today's world," says Secretary General in message to Decolonization Seminar in Indonesia", United Nations press release, 14 May 2008
- ^ "Tokelau decolonisation high on agenda". The New Zealand Herald. NZPA. 17 May 2008. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10510595. Retrieved 23 November 2011.
- ^ John Key's speech to the NZ Institute of International Affairs, 8 April 2008
- ^ "ABC Pacific News reports Tokelau target of 100% renewable energy". Abcasiapacificnews.com. 2011-12-09. http://abcasiapacificnews.com/stories/201112/3387536.htm. Retrieved 2011-12-30.
- ^ Coconuts and sunshine will power South Pacific islands New Scientist, published 2011-09-13, accessed 2011-09-14
- ^ "Net gains for tiny Pacific nation". BBC News. 14 September 2007. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6991719.stm. Retrieved 2008-05-24.
- ^ "Free Domain Terms and Conditions". http://www.dot.tk/en/doc_tcfree_v350.pdf. Retrieved March 25, 2012.
- ^ "Final count for 2011 Tokelau Census of Population and Dwellings". 2011 Tokelau Census. Statistics New Zealand. http://stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/people_and_communities/pacific_peoples/2011-tokelau-census-landing-page/final-count-2011-tokelau-census.aspx. Retrieved 16 December 2011.
- ^ "2006 Tokelau Census of Population and Dwellings" (PDF). 20 December 2006. pp. Table 2.5. http://www.spc.int/prism/country/tk/stats/Reports/2006censusrpts/2006%20Census%20Tabular%20Report%20-%20Final.pdf. Retrieved 2011-11-119.
- ^ Tokelau Census of Population and Dwellings, Table 1.3.1.
- ^ Tokelau Census of Population and Dwellings, Table 1.5.
- ^ Tokelau Census of Population and Dwellings, Table 3.2.
- ^ Tokelau Census of Population and Dwellings, Table 6.13.
- ^ "Regions and territories: Tokelau". BBC News. 16 June 2011. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/country_profiles/4712096.stm#facts. Retrieved 23 November 2011.
- ^ Medals at the 2007 Pacific Games, official website
- ^ a b "Tokelau, a Speck in the Ocean but an Important New Member for Oceania", International Table Tennis Federation, 7 October 2010
- ^ "SPORT: OUR QUEST FOR GOLD", Islands Business
- ^ Participants, website of the 2010 Commonwealth Games
- ^ McQuarrie, Peter (2007). Tokelau: People, Atolls and History. Wellington, New Zealand: Publications Committee of MacMillan Browne Centre for Pacific Studies. ISBN 978-1-877449-41-3.
External links[link]
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Textbooks from Wikibooks |
- Tokelau entry at The World Factbook
- Tokelau from UCB Libraries GovPubs
- Tokelau at the Open Directory Project
- Wikimedia Atlas of Tokelau
- Tokelau travel guide from Wikitravel
- Ethnology of Tokelau Islands
Governance[link]
- Tokelau Council of Ongoing Government, executive branch of the government
- The Administrator of Tokelau, Tokelau website of the NZ Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade
Atolls[link]
Coordinates: 09°10′S 171°50′W / 9.167°S 171.833°W / -9.167; -171.833
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| States and dependencies | New Zealand | Ross Dependency | Tokelau | Cook Islands | Niue | ||||||
| Regions | 11 non-unitary regions | 5 unitary regions | Chatham Islands | Outlying islands outside any regional authority (the Kermadec Islands, Three Kings Islands, and Sub-Antarctic Islands) |
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| Territorial authorities | 13 cities and 53 districts | ||||||||||
| Notes | Some districts lie in more than one region | These combine the regional and the territorial authority levels in one | Special territorial authority | The outlying Solander Islands form part of the Southland Region | New Zealand's Antarctic territory | Non-self-governing territory of New Zealand | States in free association with New Zealand | ||||
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Template:Intellectual property's
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Traditional knowledge (TK), indigenous knowledge (IK), traditional environmental knowledge (TEK) and local knowledge generally refer to the long-standing traditions and practices of certain regional, indigenous, or local communities. Traditional knowledge also encompasses the wisdom, knowledge, and teachings of these communities. In many cases, traditional knowledge has been orally passed for generations from person to person. Some forms of traditional knowledge are expressed through stories, legends, folklore, rituals, songs, and even laws. Other forms of traditional knowledge are expressed through different means.[1]
Contents |
Characteristics[link]
Traditional knowledge has been defined as "a cumulative body of knowledge, know-how, practices and representations maintained and developed by peoples with extended histories of interaction with the natural environment. These sophisticated sets of understandings, interpretations and meanings are part and parcel of a cultural complex that encompasses language, naming and classification systems, resource use practices, ritual, spirituality and worldview."[2]
Traditional knowledge typically distinguishes one community from another. For some communities, traditional knowledge takes on a personal and spiritual meaning. Traditional knowledge can also reflect a community's interests. Some communities depend on their traditional knowledge for survival. This is particularly true of traditional environmental knowledge, which refers to a "particular form of place-based knowledge of the diversity and interactions among plant and animal species, landforms, watercourses, and other qualities of the biophysical environment in a given place".[3] An example of a society with a wealth of TEK is the South American Kayapo people, who have developed an extensive classification system of ecological zones of the Amazonian tropical savannah (i.e., campo / cerrado) to better manage the land.[4]
Some social scientists conceptualise knowledge within a naturalistic framework, and emphasize the gradation of recent knowledge into knowledge acquired over many generations. These accounts use terms like "adaptively acquired knowledge", "socially constructed knowledge," and other terms that emphasize the social aspects of knowledge. Local knowledge and traditional knowledge may be thought of as distinguished by the length of time they have existed - decades to centuries versus millennia. A large number of scholarly studies in the naturalistic tradition demonstrate that traditional knowledge is not a natural category, and may reflect power struggles and relationships for land, resources and social control rather than adherence to a claimed ancestry or heritage.
Traditional knowledge, on the other hand, may be perceived very differently by indigenous and local communities themselves. The knowledge of indigenous and local communities is often embedded in a cosmology, and the distinction between "intangible" knowledge and physical things is often blurred. Indigenous peoples often say that "our knowledge is holistic, and cannot be separated from our lands and resources". Traditional knowledge in these cosmologies is inextricably bound to ancestors, and ancestral lands. Knowledge may not be acquired by naturalistic trial and error, but through direct revelation through conversations with "the creator", spirits, or ancestors. As Chamberlin (2003) writes of a Gitksan elder from British Columbia confronted by a government land claim: "If this is your land," he asked, "where are your stories?"
Indigenous and local communities often do not have strong traditions of ownership over knowledge that resemble the modern forms of private ownership. Many have clear traditions of custodianship over knowledge, and customary law may guide who may use different kinds of knowledge at particular times and places, and obligations that accompany the use of knowledge. From their perspective, misappropriation and misuse of knowledge may be offensive to traditions, and may have spiritual and physical repercussions in their cosmological systems. Subsequently, indigenous and local communities argue that others' use of their traditional knowledge warrants respect and sensitivity. Critics of "traditional knowledge", however, maintain that such demands for "respect" are really an attempt to prevent unsubstantiated beliefs from being subjected to the same scrutiny as other knowledge claims. This has particular significance for environmental management because the spiritual component of "traditional knowledge" can be used to justify any activity, including the unsustainable harvesting of resources.
Property rights[link]
Recently, international attention has turned to intellectual property laws to preserve, protect, and promote traditional knowledge. The reasons for this are complex. In 1992, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) recognized the value of traditional knowledge in protecting species, ecosystems and landscapes, and incorporated language regulating access to it and its use (discussed below). It was soon urged that implementing these provisions would require revision of international intellectual property agreements.
This became even more pressing with the adoption of the World Trade Organization Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs), which established rules for creating and protecting intellectual property that could be interpreted to conflict with the agreements made under the CBD. In response, the states who had ratified the CBD requested the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) to investigate the relationship between intellectual property rights, biodiversity and traditional knowledge. WIPO began this work with a fact-finding mission in 1999. Considering the issues involved with biodiversity and the broader issues in TRIPs (involving all forms of cultural expressions, not just those associated with biodiversity - including traditional designs, music, songs, stories, etc.), WIPO established the Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore (IGC-GRTKF).
The period of the early 1990s to the Millennium was also characterized by the rapid rise in global civil society. The high-level Brundtland Report (1987) recommended a change in development policy that allowed for direct community participation and respected local rights and aspirations. Indigenous peoples and others had successfully petitioned the United Nations to establish a Working Group on Indigenous Populations that made two early surveys on treaty rights and land rights. These led to a greater public and governmental recognition of indigenous land and resource rights, and the need to address the issue of collective human rights, as distinct from the individual rights of existing human rights law.
The collective human rights of indigenous and local communities has been increasingly recognized - such as in the International Labor Organization (ILO) Convention 169 (1989) and the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2007). The Rio Declaration (1992), endorsed by the presidents and ministers of the majority of the countries of the world, recognized indigenous and local communities as distinct groups with special concerns that should be addressed by states.
Initial concern was over the territorial rights and traditional resource rights of these communities. Indigenous peoples soon showed concern for the misappropriation and misuse of their "intangible" knowledge and cultural heritage. Indigenous peoples and local communities have resisted, among other things: the use of traditional symbols and designs as mascots, derivative arts and crafts; the use or modification of traditional songs; the patenting of traditional uses of medicinal plants; and the copyrighting and distribution of traditional stories.
Indigenous peoples and local communities have sought to prevent the patenting of traditional knowledge and resources where they have not given express consent. They have sought for greater protection and control over traditional knowledge and resources. Certain communities have also sought to ensure that their traditional knowledge is used equitably - according to restrictions set by their traditions, or requiring benefit sharing for its use according to benefits which they define.
Three broad approaches to protect traditional knowledge have been developed. The first emphasizes protecting traditional knowledge as a form of cultural heritage. The second looks at protection of traditional knowledge as a collective human right. The third, taken by the WTO and WIPO, investigates the use of existing or novel sui generis measures to protect traditional knowledge.
Currently, only a few nations offer explicit sui generis protection for traditional knowledge. However, a number of countries are still undecided as to whether law should give traditional knowledge deference. Indigenous peoples have shown ambivalence about the intellectual property approach. Some have been willing to investigate how existing intellectual property mechanisms (primarily: patents, copyrights, trademarks and trade secrets) can protect traditional knowledge. Others believe that an intellectual property approach may work, but will require more radical and novel forms of intellectual property law ("sui generis rights"). Others believe that the intellectual property system uses concepts and terms that are incompatible with traditional cultural concepts, and favors the commercialization of their traditions, which they generally resist. Many have argued that the form of protection should refer to collective human rights to protect their distinct identities, religions and cultural heritage.
Public domain[link]
Literary and artistic works based upon, derived from or inspired by traditional culture or folklore may incorporate new elements or expressions. Hence these works may be "new" works with a living and identifiable creator, or creators. Such contemporary works may include a new interpretation, arrangement, adaptation or collection of pre-existing cultural heritage that is in the public domain. Traditional culture or folklore may also be "repackaged" in digital formats, or restoration and colorization. Contemporary and tradition based expressions and works of traditional culture are generally protected under existing copyright law, a form of intellectual property law, as they are sufficiently original to be regarded as "new" upon publication. Once the intellectual property rights afforded to these new works of traditional knowledge expire, they fall into the public domain.[5]
The public domain, as defined in the context of intellectual property rights, is not a concept recognised by indigenous peoples. As much of traditional knowledge has never been protected under intellectual property rights, they can not be said to have entered any public domain. On this point the Tulalip Tribes of Washington state has commented that "...open sharing does not automatically confer a right to use the knowledge (of indigenous people)... traditional cultural expressions are not in the public domain because indigenous peoples have failed to take the steps necessary to protect the knowledge in the Western intellectual property system, but from a failure of governments and citizens to recognise and respect the customary laws regulating their use".[5] Equally however, the idea of restricting the use of publicly available information without clear notice and justification is regarded by many in developed nations as unethical as well as impractical[2].
Indigenous intellectual property[link]
Main article: Indigenous intellectual property
Indigenous intellectual property is an umbrella legal term used in national and international forums to identify indigenous peoples' special rights to claim (from within their own laws) all that their indigenous groups know now, have known, or will know.[6] It is a concept that has developed out of a predominantly western legal tradition, and has most recently been promoted by the World Intellectual Property Organisation, as part of a more general United Nations push [7] to see the diverse wealth of this world's indigenous, intangible cultural heritage better valued and better protected against probable, ongoing misappropriation and misuse.[8]
In the lead up to and during the United Nations International Year for the World's Indigenous Peoples (1993)[9] then during the following United Nations Decade of the World's Indigenous Peoples (1995–2004)[7] a number of conferences of both indigenous and non-indigenous specialists were held in different parts of the world, resulting in a number of declarations and statements identifying, explaining, refining, and defining 'indigenous intellectual property'.[10][11]
Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS)[link]
Article 27. 3(b) of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs) sets out certain conditions under which certain biological materials or intellectual innovations may be excluded from patenting. The Article also contains a requirement that Article 27 be reviewed. In the TRIPs-related Doha Declaration of 2001, Paragraph 19 expanded the review to a review of Article 27 and the rest of the TRIPs agreement to include the relationship between the TRIPS Agreement and the 1992 Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and the protection of traditional knowledge and folklore.
The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD)[link]
The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), signed at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in 1992, was the first international environmental convention to develop measures for the use and protection of traditional knowledge, related to the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity. By 2006, 188 had ratified the Convention and agreed to be bound by its provisions, the largest number of nations to accede to any existing treaty (the United States is one of the few countries that has signed, but not ratified, the CBD). Significant provisions include:
Article 8. In-situ Conservation Each Contracting Party shall, as far as possible and as appropriate: (a)... (j) Subject to its national legislation, respect, preserve and maintain knowledge, innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities embodying traditional lifestyles relevant for the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity and promote their wider application with the approval and involvement of the holders of such knowledge, innovations and practices and encourage the equitable sharing of the benefits arising from the utilization of such knowledge, innovations and practices... Article 10. Sustainable Use of Components of Biological Diversity Each Contracting Party shall, as far as possible and as appropriate: (a)... (c) Protect and encourage customary use of biological resources in accordance with traditional cultural practices that are compatible with conservation or sustainable use requirements
The interpretation of these provisions has been elaborated through decisions by the parties (ratifiers of the Convention) (see the Convention on Biological Diversity Handbook, available free in digital format from the Secretariat).
At the Convention on Biological Diversity meeting, in Buenos Aires, in 1996, emphasis was put on local knowledge. Key players, such as local communities and indigenous peoples, should be recognized by States, and have their sovereignty recognised over the biodiversity of their territories, so that they can continue protecting it.[12]
The parties to the Convention set a 2010 target to negotiate an international legally-binding regime on access and benefit sharing (ABS) at the Eighth meeting (COP8), 20–31 March 2006 in Curitiba, Brazil. This target was met in October 2010 in Nagoya, Japan, by conclusion of the Nagoya Protocol to the CBD. The agreement is now open for ratification, and will come into force when 50 signatories have ratified it. So far five have done so (Mexico is the largest to date) but many will follow. The Protocol treats of inter-governmental obligations related to genetic resources, and includes measures related to the rights of indigenous and local communities to control access to and derive benefits from the use of genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge.
Commons and intellectual property[link]
Recently, traditional knowledge has been drawn into the debate related to access to medicines, access to food, the need for poverty alleviation, and related issues that affect the livelihoods and welfare of people worldwide. It has been argued that traditional knowledge is an important source of health security, food security and livelihood security for the world's poor. As such, it has been argued that the benefits of sharing and actively disseminating traditional knowledge outweigh the benefits of protection and recognition of ownership.[citation needed]
The Creative Commons, with its roots in the open software movement, the literary arts, the open access movement in science and the humanities, and in the media, arts, entertainment and communications communities, has also proposed that traditional knowledge is an essential and public source of cultural creativity. Part of the debate involves the question of whether or not traditional knowledge is part of the public sphere, national commons, or global commons as part of a "common heritage of mankind". There is no common indigenous and local community position on issues of the "common heritage of mankind" or the "global public good". Indigenous peoples and local communities have shared much of their knowledge and resources with the global community and many have traditions of sharing. Healers, in general, have spiritual obligations to heal the sick and have shared their healing knowledge. Indigenous peoples have strong traditions of reciprocity, that is people's informal exchange of goods and labour. Much of the historical appropriation and use of traditional knowledge has not occurred with reciprocity. Though traditional knowledge and resources have made contributions to the welfare of humankind as the basis of much of the world's food system and naturally-derived medicines.[citation needed]
Government of India efforts[link]
In 2001, the Government of India set up the Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) as repository of 1200 formulations of various systems of Indian medicine, such as Ayurveda, Unani and Siddha and 1500 Yoga postures (asanas), translated into five languages — English, German, French, Spanish and Japanese.[13][14] India has also signed agreements with the European Patent Office (EPO), United Kingdom Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) and the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) to prevent the grant of invalid patents by giving patent examiners at International Patent Offices access to the TKDL database for patent search and examination.[14][15][16]
IPR Policy of Kerala Govt.(India) - Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) Policy for Kerala released in 2008 [17], proposes adoption of the concepts ‘knowledge commons’ and ‘commons licence’ for the protection of traditional knowledge. The chief architects of the Policy are Prof. Prabhat Patnaik and Mr. R.S. Praveen Raj. The policy seeks to put all traditional knowledge into the realm of “knowledge commons”, distinguishing this from the public domain. While codification of TK in digital libraries and sharing the same with patent offices prevents direct misappropriation, it is feared that it may provide an opportunity for private appropriation by making cosmetic improvements to such traditional knowledge that is not readily accessible otherwise. TKDL cannot at the same time be kept confidential and treated as prior art - says R.S. Praveen Raj [18]
See also[link]
- Biopiracy
- Convention on Biological Diversity
- Ethnoastronomy
- Ethnobiology
- Ethnobotany
- Ethnoecology
- Ethnomathematics
- Ethnomedicine
- Ethnopharmacy
- Ethnoscience
- Ethnozoology
- Indigenous intellectual property
- Indigenous peoples
- Intangible Cultural Heritage
- Intellectual property
- Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (traditional knoweledge in Arctic Canada)
- Sui generis protection
- Traditional medicine
- Traditional knowledge GIS
- Traditional Ecological Knowledge
- World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)
- Yoga piracy
References[link]
- ^ Acharya, Deepak and Shrivastava Anshu (2008): Indigenous Herbal Medicines: Tribal Formulations and Traditional Herbal Practices, Aavishkar Publishers Distributor, Jaipur- India. ISBN 978-81-7910-252-7. pp 440
- ^ International Council for Science / Conseil International pour la Science (March 2002). "Science and Traditional Knowledge: Report from the ICSU Study Group on Science and Traditional Knowledge". p. 3. http://www.icsu.org/publications/reports-and-reviews/science-traditional-knowledge/Science-traditional-knowledge.pdf. Retrieved 24 May 2012.
- ^ Peña, Devon G.,Mexican Americans and the Environment, The University of Arizona Press, 2005, p. 198.
- ^ Posey, Darrel Addison. "Indigenous Management of Tropical Forest Ecosystems: The case of the Kayapo Indians of the Brazilian Amazon" in Dove and Carpenter, Environmental Anthropology: a historical reader, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, 2008, p. 90.
- ^ a b Graber, Christoph Beat; and Mira Burri Nenova (2008). Intellectual Property and Traditional Cultural Expressions in a digital environment. Edward Elgar Publishing. pp. 174. ISBN 1-84720-921-1, 9781847209214. http://www.google.com/books?id=gK6OI0hrANsC&dq=%22public+domain%22+intellectual+property&lr=&as_brr=3&source=gbs_navlinks_s.
- ^ RAINFOREST ABORIGINAL NETWORK (1993) Julayinbul: Aboriginal Intellectual and Cultural Property Definitions, Ownership and Strategies for Protection. Rainforest Aboriginal Network. Cairns. Page 65
- ^ a b OFFICE OF THE UNITED NATIONS HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR HUMAN RIGHTS (2007). "Indigenous peoples" (WEB PAGE). Office of the United Nations High Commissioner of Human Rights. Geneva. Archived from the original on 2007-11-07. http://web.archive.org/web/20071107144031/http://www.ohchr.org/english/issues/indigenous/. Retrieved 2007-11-29.
- ^ DODSON, Page 12.
- ^ WATSON, Irene (1992). "1993: International Year for Indigenous Peoples". Aboriginal Law Bulletin. AustLII. http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/AboriginalLB/1992/52.html. Retrieved 2007-11-29.
- ^ WORLD INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY ORGANISATION (2001)
- ^ http://www.indigenouspeoplesissues.com/index.php?option=com_search&areas=content&searchphrase=all&searchword=TEK Indigenous People and Traditional Knowledge: Resources
- ^ The CBD: Local knowledge systems at the heart of international debates, B. Roussel, Synthèse, n° 2, 2003, Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations. [1]
- ^ Traditional Knowledge Digital Library website.
- ^ a b "Know Instances of Patenting on the UES of Medicinal Plants in India". PIB, Ministry of Environment and Forests. May 6, 2010. http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=61511. Retrieved 21 May 2010.
- ^ "CSIR wing objects to Avesthagen patent claim". Live Mint. April 28, 2010. http://www.livemint.com/2010/04/28214947/CSIR-wing-objects-to-Avesthage.html.
- ^ "India Partners with US and UK to Protect Its Traditional Knowledge and Prevent Bio-Piracy". Press Information Bureau, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. April 28, 2010. http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=61122. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
- ^ "IPRs policy proposes ‘knowledge commons'". The Hindu (Chennai, India). 28 June 2008. http://www.hindu.com/2008/06/28/stories/2008062856600100.htm.
- ^ http://www.businessline.in/cgi-bin/print.pl?file=2010012551041500.htm&date=2010/01/25/&prd=bl
External links[link]
 |
This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. Please improve this article by removing excessive or inappropriate external links, and converting useful links where appropriate into footnote references. (August 2010) |
- UNEP Indigenous Knowledge Website
- UNEP Indigenous People's Website
- "Traditional Knowledge" on the WIPO web site
- CBD Article 8(j): Traditional Knowledge, Innovations and Practices
- Convention on Biological Diversity Handbook, 3rd ed.
- World Bank's Indigenous Knowledge (IK) Program's website
- WTO: TRIPs Article 27.3b, traditional knowledge, biodiversity
- United Nations University's "Traditional Knowledge Bulletin"
- International Workshop on Free, Prior and Informed Consent and Indigenous Peoples
- Call of the Earth / Llamado de la Tierra
- Statement by the Tulalip Tribes of Washington on Folklore, Indigenous Knowledge, and the Public Domain, July 09, 2003
- IPRs Online: Traditional Knowledge
- Linking Science and Local Knowledge
- Intellectual Property Rights, Open Source Methods and Traditional Knowledge in Developing Countries
- Anti-colonial discourse and indigenous knowledges
- Traditional ecological knowledge handbook : a training manual and reference guide for designing, conducting, and participating in research projects using traditional ecological knowledge / prepared by Rita A. Miraglia. Hosted by Alaska State Publications Program.
- Research article by Terra Nuova on "Preservation and maintenance of biological diversity related knowledge of indigenous diversity and local communities with traditional lifestyles Bony Forest, Ijara District"
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Tokelau ( /ˈtoʊkəlaʊ/) is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1,400. The atolls lie north of the Samoan Islands, east of Tuvalu, south of the Phoenix Islands, southwest of the more distant Line Islands (both island groups belonging to Kiribati) and northwest of the Cook Islands.
The United Nations General Assembly designated Tokelau a Non-Self-Governing Territory. Until 1976 the official name was Tokelau Islands. Tokelau is sometimes referred to by the older, colonial name of The Union Islands.
The name Tokelau is a Polynesian word meaning "North Wind". The islands were named the Union Islands and Union Group by European explorers at an unknown time. Tokelau Islands was adopted as the name in 1946, and was contracted to Tokelau on 9 December 1976.
The change from Tokelau Islands to Tokelau marked a slight shift in emphasis, with consequences in regional diplomacy, in that the term Tokelau Islands clearly and substantially referred to a geographical expression, that is, a range of islands, whatever else it may connote. It is not necessarily controversial to refer by name to a range of islands, even though they may come under two or more political jurisdictions. Tokelau, on the other hand, can be taken to refer more immediately to some concept of nationhood, arguably infusing increased meaning to the draft 2006 independence constitution of Tokelau (which somewhat controversially claims Tokelauan inhabited Olohega (or Swains Island), currently part of American Samoa, as part of its national territory).[citation needed]
