Russian belligerence has drawn the world’s attention back to the eight-year-old secessionist rebellion in the Donbas region: a deadlocked, time-warped conflict with no end in sight.

The film Ophir, about the Bougainville crisis and its aftermath, has screened at almost hundreds festivals worldwide since its release in 2020. It also won the the top prize at the Pacific Documentary Film Festival in Tahiti, an achievement which was very dear to French director Olivier Pollet.

We are sorry to announce that our event De Facto LIVE #3 of 20 January will be postponed until further notice. Those of you who already purchased a ticket will be contacted by the Roode Bioscoop in Amsterdam. We hope to see you soon!

There is a political crisis in South Ossetia, the reason for which was the issue of delimitation and demarcation of the border with Georgia. The crisis around the border actually turned into a conflict between representatives of the previous and current authorities.

Since hostilities between Morocco and the pro-independence Polisario Front in Western Sahara resumed in November 2020, the EU has been reluctant to play an active role in the conflict. But a recent EU Court of Justice ruling against the inclusion of Western Sahara in the EU-Morocco trade deal could soon force Brussels to step into the fray.

Early in January 1949 James Thomas Mangan claimed a new nation that was formed by ‘all of outer space’. According to Mangan, no other country should have political hegemony in space and he protested actively against improper use of his territory, asking to ban nuclear tests and space flights. Mangan was praised and ridiculed during his lifetime.

The British overseas territory, Gibraltar, that was once perceived as a tax haven, might be be making history soon by becoming the world’s first global hub for cryptocurrency trading.

Almost three decades on from the fighting that saw Transnistria, South Ossetia, and Abkhazia become unrecognised states, how has geopolitical limbo shaped the lives of the region’s creative ecosystem?

A visual guide to recent troop deployments, as tensions escalate.

Western Sahara is mostly under Morocco’s control, where tensions with pro-independence Polisario Front have simmered since the 1970s.

A video feed of a Taiwanese minister was cut during U.S. President Joe Biden’s Summit for Democracy last week after a map in her slide presentation showed Taiwan in a different color to China, which claims the island as its own.

The Russian-backed breakaway region re-elected its existing leader, Vadim Krasnoselsky, in a poll that few countries – except Russia – bothered to observe and which Moldova declared illegitimate.

A threat actor has hacked the website of the Principality of Sealand, a micronation in the North Sea, and planted malicious code on its web store, which the government is using to sell baron, count, duke, and other nobility titles.

In 2000, Madeiran art teacher Renato de Barros bought this small tip of land, an island and fort in the Funchal harbor of Madeira and he declared independence from Portugal, proclaiming himself Prince of Pontinha. ‘Pontinha means “a point”. All change in the world begins with something very small, and this is my country—just a little point.‘ Check out this new place of the week.

India’s anti-terrorism agency arrested Khurram Parvez, a prominent human rights activist in Kashmir. Parvez is the program coordinator for the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society, that for decades has monitored and investigated human rights violations in Kashmir, a Muslim-majority enclave claimed by India and Pakistan.

Join us for the International Documentary Festival Amsterdam in the Netherlands. Many great films, among which quite a few about curious borders.

Exactly twenty years ago, one of the world’s largest micronations was founded: the Grand Duchy of Westarctica. In 2001 Travis McHenry found out that ‘no formal claims have been made in the sector between 90 degrees west and 150 degrees west’, which inspired him to claim this specific part of land.

We are sorry to announce that our event De Facto LIVE #3 of 20 January will be postponed until further notice. Those of you who already purchased a ticket will be contacted by the Roode Bioscoop in Amsterdam. We hope to see you soon!

The development of both Donetsk and Transnistria have a strong tendency to be seen as vessels for Russia’s search for influence in a Post-Soviet world. Yet these states are just as much the result of local context and the geopolitical storm that surrounds them. However, whatever the causes of their tribulations, the burden of international abandonment falls on the people in these nations.

Chilean President Sebastian Pinera has announced a state of emergency and deployed troops to two southern regions where clashes have broken out between Mapuche indigenous people and security forces. The Mapuche are demanding the restoration of their ancestral lands and self-determination.

In Blood and Honey: Encounters at the Borders of the Balkans, Dutch journalist Irene van der Linde and documentary photographer Nicole Segers set out to document the borders of the Balkans. Go and watch their work at Museum Het Valkhof in Nijmegen (the Netherlands).

Tsai Ing-wen condemns China’s plans for Taiwan and says island will continue to build its defences.

Former Catalan separatist leader says he is ‘very happy’ after walking free from Sardinian court.

The UAE deputy foreign minister’s address to the United Nations stirred up the territorial dispute, which has long been at the very core of tensions between the Arab state and the Islamic Republic.

One year after the war in Nagorno-Karabakh, there is nothing that would carry even a faint promise of reconciliation and co-existence.

French adventurer Antoine de Tounens created this vassal kingdom of France in Patagonia in 1860 but was declared insane and got sent back to France. The Kingdom of Araucanía and Patagonia is the last remnant to create autonomy for the Mapuche people, the indigenous inhabitants of south-central Chile and southwestern Argentina.

Kosovo deployed special police units as Serbs blocked roads near border crossing points with Serbia after the Pristina government imposed new rules forcing them to switch to temporary Kosovo licence plates when entering the country. “This is a direct threat to our people”, local protesters say.

The exhibition ‘Power, Lust and Zinc’ is now on show at Bureau Europa in Maastricht (the Netherlands). The history of this metal tells of political struggles and the European ambition for unification. Most zinc was won in Kelmis, today in Belgium, where ground was so rich that border disputes arose. The diplomatic solution was the erection of a new country: Neutral Moresnet.

On 9/11 the focus turns to Guantanamo Bay, the oldest US overseas naval base. It was leased from Cuba in 1903, despite continuous protests of the Cuban government. Since 2002 it was used to detain prisoners from the War on terror, over 750 detainees were being held there. The camp has been criticized widely by human rights organizations: prisoners are being kept indefinitely without trial and several detainees having been allegedly tortured. Today, 39 prisoners remain.

Exactly thirthy-one years ago, Transnistria declared independence from Moldova. This week it wrote history, entering the Champions League with its football club FC Sheriff Tiraspol. Welcome to the country that officially still does not exist.