Congo, Democratic Republic of the heads of the Great Lakes states and UN pledge to end conflict but unchecked tribal, rebel, and militia fighting continues unabated in the northeastern region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, drawing in the neighboring states of Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda; the UN Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC) has maintained over 14,000 peacekeepers in the region since 1999; thousands of Ituri refugees from the Congo continue to flee the fighting primarily into Uganda; 90,000 Angolan refugees were repatriated by 2004 with the remainder in the DRC expected to return in 2005; in 2005, DRC and Rwanda established a border verification mechanism to address accusations of Rwandan military supporting Congolese rebels and the DRC providing rebel Rwandan "Interhamwe" forces the means and bases to attack Rwandan forces; the location of the boundary in the broad Congo River with the Republic of the Congo is indefinite except in the Pool Malebo/Stanley Pool area
Congo, Republic of the
about 7,000 Congolese refugees fleeing
internal civil conflicts since the mid-1990s still reside in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo; the location of the boundary in
the broad Congo River with the Democratic Republic of the Congo is
indefinite except in the Pool Malebo/Stanley Pool area
Cook Islands
none
Coral Sea Islands
none
Costa Rica
in September 2005, Costa Rica took its case before the
ICJ to advocate the navigation, security, and commercial rights of
Costa Rican vessels using the Río San Juan over which Nicaragua
retains sovereignty
Cote d'Ivoire
rebel and ethnic fighting against the central
government in 2002 has spilled into neighboring states, driven out
foreign cocoa workers from nearby countries, and, in 2004, resulted
in 6,000 peacekeepers deployed as part of UN Operation in Cote
d'Ivoire (UNOCI) assisting 4,000 French troops already in-country;
the Ivorian Government accuses Burkina Faso and Liberia of
supporting Ivorian rebels
Croatia
discussions continue with Bosnia and Herzegovina over
several small disputed sections of the boundary related to maritime
access that hinders ratification of the 1999 border agreement; the
Croatia-Slovenia land and maritime boundary agreement, which would
have ceded most of Pirin Bay and maritime access to Slovenia and
several villages to Croatia, remains un-ratified and in dispute; as
a European Union peripheral state, neighboring Slovenia must conform
to the strict Schengen border rules to curb illegal migration and
commerce through southeastern Europe while encouraging close
cross-border ties with Croatia
Cuba
US Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay is leased to US and only mutual
agreement or US abandonment of the area can terminate the lease
Cyprus
hostilities in 1974 divided the island into two de facto
autonomous entities, the internationally recognized Cypriot
Government and a Turkish-Cypriot community (north Cyprus); the
1,000-strong UN Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) has served in
Cyprus since 1964 and maintains the buffer zone between north and
south; March 2003 reunification talks failed, but Turkish-Cypriots
later opened their borders to temporary visits by Greek Cypriots; on
24 April 2004, the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot communities
voted in simultaneous and parallel referenda on whether to approve
the UN-brokered Annan Plan that would have ended the 30-year
division of the island by establishing a new "United Cyprus
Republic," a majority of Greek Cypriots voted "no"; on 1 May 2004,
Cyprus entered the European Union still divided, with the EU's body
of legislation and standards (acquis communitaire) suspended in the
north
Czech Republic
in February 2005, the ICJ refused to rule on the
restitution of Liechtenstein's land and property assets in the Czech
Republic confiscated in 1945 as German property; individual Sudeten
Germans seek restitution for property confiscated in connection with
their expulsion from Czechoslovakia after World War II; Austrian
anti-nuclear activists have revived blockades of the Czech-Austrian
border to protest operation of the Temelin nuclear power plant in
the Czech Republic