Well, somebody or some entity transferred territory from Germany to Poland at the end of the Second World War. It was formerly recognized as a part of Germany before. Afterwards, maybe long afterwards, it was recognized as a part of Poland. That should count as a “transfer of territory from one country to another” by the stipulations laid out in the OP.
Less controversial example involving Poland is the 1951 land exchange.
True. That somebody was either the three main Allied powers at Potsdam, according to the Soviet interpretation, or the Soviet Union unilaterally, according to the West German interpretation (which held that the Allies at Potsdam placed these areas under temporary Polish administration but did not transfer sovereignty). Either way it would not have been a contractual cession. Whether such territorial changes imposed upon a defeated country by victors meets the OP’s definition is debatable, I suppose.
This is sort of a mixed example. The ADV China guys on YouTube explored the region around the China/Russia border, noting that numerous Russian people got “stranded” on the Chinese side when the borders were shifted (and presumably vice versa). It wasn’t exactly a territory swap though. It was apparently the case that this remote region never had a well-defined border to begin with, and both countries half-assed their effort to properly delineate it, which ended up slicing through some villages and putting others on the “wrong” side of the new border.
Just a quick response to say I am finding this discussion really interesting so thanks to everyone for these fascinating nuggets of border information.
There is a little corner of eastern Quebec that was transferred to Maine as a result of resurvey. The main difference is that gasoline and cigarettes are now cheaper and local Quebecois run over there all the time to save money. But the only way the cigarettes and gas gets there is on bonded trucks coming from Quebec since there are no roads there through Maine. They still get electricity and most other services from Quebec. I read about this once but cannot find anything about from google.
In 1949, the Netherlands took over a number of pieces of territory from Germany as recompense for occupation during WW II. There were about 6,650 people in all the pieces combined. It was all returned in 1963, save for one small uninhabited hill that the Netherlands kept.
At one point, the plan for territorial compensation for WW II would have resulted in the Netherlands expanding its territory by about 1/3, but NL decided it didn’t really want to deal absorbing the germans who had NL ties while expelling the ones who didn’t.
More details can be found this this wiki article on Dutch Annexation: implementation & return
The territories had not been particularly disputed before either the first transfer or the transfer back. Germany paid to get the territories back.
I did visit the village of Suderwick which was dutch from 1949-1963. It didn’t look much different from the adjacent dutch village of Dinxperlo.
That is the village of Estcourt Station (pop.: 4) whose purpose seems to be to sell cheap gasoline and cigarettes to Canadians. Why would they want to swap it back?
I found another one: a strip of land on the banks of the Danube ceded from Ukraine to Moldova in 2005, allowing Moldova access to the Black Sea. Sounds like the Moldovans got the better part of the deal.
Port of Giurgiulești - Wikipedia
The Port of Giurgiulești was built as result of a 2005 territorial exchange with Ukraine, where Moldova received a 430[7] meters (470 yard) bank of the Danube and Prut rivers (which is an international waterway).[8][9]
Ukraine was supposed to receive a short section of road that leaves and re-enters Ukrainian territory near the Moldovan village of Palanca at the easternmost point of Moldova. After a long territorial dispute, it was decided that Moldova would keep the land but the road itself would be owned and maintained by Ukrainians. So now all vehicles have to go through the checkpoint while driving from Ukraine to Ukraine.
The reason I was curious is that I was thinking about a hypothetical scenario where Northern Ireland is transferred from the UK to Ireland at some future time, for example following a border poll as envisaged in the Belfast Agreement. Both parties to the Agreement have agreed to respect the result.
Based on the answers above, this would be almost unprecedented in recent history. All the examples we’ve found so far represent tiny parcels of land with small populations, while Northern Ireland is a much larger and more populated territory by comparison.
The former East Prussian city of Konigsburg/Kaliningrad and surrounding area was agreed to be ceded to the USSR as part of the Potsdam Agreement.
That’s not a cession in the international law sense, because the state to which the territory previously belonged was not a party to the agreement. It was a redrawing of the borders of a defeated country by the winning countries in the exercise of the sovereign power which they had assumed over that country. This redrawing was subsequently recognised by the two German states, and today’s Germany lays no claim to Kaliningrad or any of the other territories east of the modern German-Polish border, but in making this recognition the two Germanies merely recognised an already existing border, they did not bring it about in a constitutive sense.
Contrast this with the Versailles Treaty, which did contain genuine cessions in the international law sense because Germany was a party to that treaty.
The comparator for the putative Northern Ireland situation would be the unification of East and West Germany (though maybe less complicated in terms of adjustment of laws and social/economic regulations). I don’t think (whatever diehard NI Unionists might say) that many people in the UK would regard it as a cession of “our” territory.
Legally speaking it would be, though, since NI is an integral part of the UK. So this would be quite different from, e.g., the return of Hong Kong to China. You’d have territory of the UK being excluded from the UK and included in Ireland, and the denizens of that territory would cease to be UK residents and would become residents of Ireland. There’s be a host of practical questions arising out of that - e.g. who would honour the pension and other entitlements already secured by the denizens concerned by the payment of national insurance contributions in the UK? And, as hibernicus points out this would be a transfer of territory and population on a larger scale that has happened anywhere since 1945, so these questions might have a major impact and major financial implications.
Terminologically, in international law, several different scenarios of changes in territory are to be distinguished:
- A cession, where an existing state A transfers part of its territory to state B. Both A and B continue to exist after the transaction, only part of A’s territory is transferred.
- An accession, where an existing state A joins state B. A ceases to exist, B continues to exist, incorporating A’s former territory.
- A fusion, where two existing states A and B join together to form a new state C that is not identical to either A or B but incorporates their former territory.
- A secession, where part of state A’s territory leaves A and forms a newly established state B. It is the opposite of the accession.
- A dismembration, where an existing state A falls apart into more than one component states and none of the new states is identical to the former state A, which ceases to exist. It is the opposite of the fusion.
The reunification of Germany was an accession. The dissolution of the Soviet Union was (at least in the prevailing view) a secession, where the resulting Russian Federation continued the legal position and identity of the old Soviet Union. The dissolution of Yugoslavia was (at least in the prevailing view) a dismembration; Serbia tried to continue former Yugoslavia’s international position, but that was not accepted by the international community, and Serbia had to re-apply for UN membership.
True cessions in the strict sense as described above are rare. The hypothetical Northern Ireland scenario would be one (assuming that the UK continues to exist; it would, of course, be conceivable to assume a dismembration of the UK into its component countries, after which Norther Ireland accedes to the Republic of Ireland). It would be the most significant case, in terms of population and territory affected, of a cession since 1919.
Also note that it is common practice in cases of cessions to leave the population of the ceded territory the choice between the citizenship of the old and the new state. In the Northern Ireland case this would be of lesser importance since most residents of Northern Ireland already hold entitlement to claim Irish citizenship under Irish law.
And it was part of the process establishing the then Irish Free State that its citizens resident anywhere in the UK would be entitled to vote in UK elections. That followed from the fact that the IFS was technically still a Dominion in the Commonwealth, but the provision was confirmed in UK law when the Republic was formally established and left the Commonwealth in 1949. Likewise, the Common Travel Area obviated another potential practical irritation. Of course disentangling finances and debts will take time, but it was done after 1922, so could be done again on the smaller scale on Northern Ireland.
They may be rare, but over half the United States territory was acquired by cession. Admittedly, they were overseas territories of the ceding country that were largely unpopulated. (By Europeans, that is. No one asked the resident natives their opinion of the transactions.) And all were in the 19th century.
Four of the cessions were cash transactions. Other than Rupert’s Land being sold to Canada, are there any other instances of countries buying land from another?
Louisiana, Alaska, Gadsden, Virgin Islands…but the last one was in 1917.
I wasn’t counting the Virgin Islands, since I was only considering territory that has become states. The US paid Mexico for the part of the southwest that wasn’t part of Texas. Admittedly, it was a forced sale, but Santa Ana had no problem taking the money and spending it as he pleased.
List of territory purchased by a sovereign nation from another sovereign nation - Wikipedia
(Not being smart - I found the question interesting so I googled it!)