Pondering this for a potential qwiz qwestion, I was rather bemused by what actually counts as a landlocked country? Some are obvious-no coasts of any sort just land wherever you go(Niger,Bolivia,Paraguay)But what about those that have an inland coast,like Kazahstan which has a huge coastline but on the Caspian Sea or Uganda which has a border on Lake Victoria.
And just how much coastline is too much? DR Congo has a tiny little bit of coastline which is actually on an inlet of the Atlantic. If you count it as a river then it wouldnt be a proper coast. If it’s just a blip in the sea, then it would be.
Typically, the expression implies that a country must export/import raw materials and finished goods through another country, with all the strategic and geopolitical drawbacks that go with that (eg, your neighbor with a sea port can hold you to ransom by cutting you off). Having a coast on a big lake might leave you less exposed, or it might not - depends on the circumstances.
Look at US state boundaries - Mississippi, Alabama and Pennsylvania all have access to a sea/lake that suggests (to me) someone deliberately drew the map to ensure they weren’t landlocked.
When the CIA looks at Uganda, they consider it landlocked.
The CIA views D R of Congo as not landlocked, with 37 kilometers of shoreline, (but, more importantly, with a major navigable river exiting to the ocean).
In the case of Paraguay, (landlocked), the Rio Paraná is actually navigable to small traffic, (not to current ocean freighters), but it passes wholly through Argentina, giving Paraguay no unrestricted access to the sea.
Iraq’s 58 km of shoreline with a harbor put it into the “not landlocked” category, (although a sufficiently strong Iran or Saudi Arabia could clearly prevent its use–apparently, there is a certain presumption of respect for international law when designating landlocked or not).
