Bougainville has voted overwhelmingly for independence from Papua New Guinea, but what happens next when you want to become an independent state? What do you have to do to become a new country?
Who needs to recognise you as independent?
There isn’t a simple step-by-step guide in law to creating a country but the right to the self-determination of people is recognised in the charter of the UN. A territory becomes a sovereign state when its independence is recognised by the UN. That usually means that whoever the territory used to legally belong to has agreed – or been forced to agree – that it is no longer theirs.
Along with recognition, you need the basic building blocks of statehood: a constitution, a head of state, and a government. You also need some kind of diplomatic service in place in order to have relations with other states. And, while there are about 22 countries that do not have them – Andorra, Liechtenstein and Samoa among them – you will almost certainly want some kind of armed forces to defend your new borders.
Depending on the situation, the UN may be much more involved in the process than simply recognising the end result. After years of conflict, for example, Timor-Leste was under UN protection when the international body organised the 1999 independence referendum, and the UN also supervised the election of a constituent assembly to write the new country’s first constitution.
How will you present yourself to the rest of the world?
You’ll need a flag and a national anthem. If an area has had a longstanding independence movement, like Catalonia or the Basque region, it is likely you will already have these symbols in place ready to deploy.
And you don’t always have to be that creative. When Uzbekistan became independent in 1991, Abdulla Oripov simply wrote new lyrics for the tune of the Soviet-era Uzbek anthem, and gave it the unimaginative title of State Anthem of the Republic of Uzbekistan.
South Sudan had an X-Factor style talent show to pick its anthem – ultimately choosing students from Juba University with South Sudan Oyee!
When do you get your moment on the world’s sporting stage?
Any new country will want to take its proud place in the sporting world – but the path isn’t always easy. Kosovo declared independence in 2008 but was not admitted to Fifa to participate in international football until 2016. Even then, as Serbia still claims the territory, 23 countries voted against admitting the Balkan state. Their first international tournament was attempting to qualify for the 2018 World Cup.
To appear at the Olympics, you have to form your own National Olympic Committee, and in turn have that recognised by the International Olympic Committee. The most recent country admitted to the IOC was South Sudan in 2015. The country sent three athletes to Rio in 2016 for its Olympic debut, five years after independence.
