- Contested territories
- Claimed by Morocco
- Population 82,376 (Ceuta) & 78,476 (Melilla)
- Area 18.5 km² (Ceuta) & 12.3 km² (Melilla)
- Mayor-president Juan Jesús Vivas (Ceuta) & Juan José Imbroda (Melilla)
Ceuta and Melilla are Spanish exclaves on the north coast of Africa, separated from the Spanish mainland by the Strait of Gibraltar and the Mediterranean Sea. The government of Morocco has repeatedly called for Spain to transfer the sovereignty of Ceuta and Melilla, together with the rest of the Spanish plazas de soberanía on the North African coast to Morocco. Morocco has claimed that the territories are colonies.
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Abkhazia
Abkhazia lies on the eastern coast of the Black Sea, flanked by Russia to the North and Georgia to the South. In 1990, just before the dissolution of the USSR, Abkhazia declared its sovereignty. This was not accepted by neighbor state Georgia nor the government in Moscow and led to an armed conflict in 1992 which lasted for 14 months. The Georgian troops were forced to leave Abkhazia and in 1994 a new constitution was drawn. It was adopted by popular referendum in 1999 after which Abkhazia once again declared its State Sovereignty. However, it was only after Abkhazian forces fought against Georgian forces during the Russo-Georgian War in 2008 that Abkhazia was formally recognized by Russia. It is also recognized as an independent state by Venezuela, Nicaragua, Syria, Nauru, South Ossetia, Transnistria and Nagorno-Karabakh. The Parliament of Georgia still considers Abkhazia as an autonomous republic within its territory.
