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In 2008 there have been numerous disputes, peaceful and not, with regard to borders. In some cases these disputes turned violent. The biggest border conflicts and disputes have resulted in tensions between Israel and Gaza, Russia and Georgia, India and Pakistan, Turkey and Iraq, and Afghanistan and Pakistan. The peaceful border tensions are between the U.S. and Mexico and the ongoing debate about the status of Cyprus. Aside from the geographical border disputes and tensions, the economic crisis has shown the world that economic borders are not that safe as well.
In 2009, many nations that have border disputes will try to settle them. After the fall of the USSR, borders of many countries have destabilised and there are many regions and territories in the world that would like to see independence. After having numerous countries engage in open and political conflicts in 2008 with regard to borders, leaders of some nations look like they have realised that borders need to be set and finalised once and for all, preferably without the use of force.
Geographical
There is an argument that, in order to have a stable regime, whatever it may be, inside a country, that nation needs to have stable borders. Support for this argument is abundant, and there are few that would disagree. However, it seems that only now is this argument really finding its place in the global arena. Russian President Dmitriy Medvedev has assigned an advisory commission to present solutions to Russian border disputes, to map those borders, and to finalise them, so everyone knows where the nation’s borders are drawn.
As Israel has had numerous clashes with its neighbours, it has become evident that it needs to start working towards more stable and accurate borders in order to avoid conflicts such as the one in Gaza. Therefore it could definitely say that a rocket attack, or any attack, over that particular given line will automatically result in an open conflict.
Gaza’s borders are not stable. Israel set up a wall, literally and figuratively that isolates the people inside the Gaza strip. Israel even goes as far as to not allow international aid workers to bring in supplies and medication to Palestinians living in the Gaza strip. During Israel’s short campaign in the Gaza strip, the Israeli Navy went as far as ramming a ship full of humanitarian aid intended for the Palestinian civilians. Israel’s conflicts have been coupled by political instability. Not that the regime has changed or has any intention to do so, it is that the Israeli government has largely been unstable and its leaders and prominent politicians have been at the center of attention for shady activities on numerous occasions.
Another country with unstable borders and even more unstable relations with its neighbours is Pakistan. It has been in the spotlight quite often recently. First of all, its borders with Afghanistan are nearly unguarded, to say the least. Secondly, after the events in Mumbai, Indian-Pakistani borders have become as tense as ever because of India’s accusations that Islamabad had trained and even organised the attack in Mumbai.
Northern Waziristan, according to U.S. sources, is a base of operations for Al-Qaeda. The U.S. military has been launching raids into Pakistan on many occasion, stating the fact that Pakistan’s military has nearly no control over the province and lets insurgents roam freely over the Afghan-Pakistan border.
Evidence of instability in Pakistan is seen through the change of power in August of 2008, the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, and many other events. All of this can be linked to the fact that the borders of Pakistan are very insecure.
The United States, although most stable out of the above mentioned countries, has their own instability to deal with. The U.S. erected a fence going between Mexico and the U.S. The illegal immigration of Mexicans to their northern neighbour has stirred up a lot of controversy. The fence was erected exactly for the reasons of stabilising the inside of the country, rather than the illegal immigration situation. The Bush administration was already speeding downhill at the time of the decision to erect the fence. Its hope did not do anything to stabilise their situation and slow down their descent in public approval. Nevertheless, it was an attempt at getting the situation under control.
Now, Barack Obama will try and secure the border with means other than physically trying to get in the way of the illegal migrant inflow into the U.S. Whatever the means are, they are aimed primarily at stabilising the order primarily in the Southern and Southwestern United States. Whatever the arguments may be for and against, it is a fact that illegal immigration destabilises the order in places that illegal migrants go to because they are willing to work for below the minimum wage and thus cost jobs that actually create tax revenue. This is the issue with border stabilisation between the U.S. and Mexico.
Cyprus and Turkey have another border issue to deal with on the international arena, primarily due to Turkish aspirations to join the EU. The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus is only recognised by Turkey, and thus Turkey will need to determine what is more important: a small area that has been disputed since the British colonial rule, or the current issue of joining the EU. It will have to draw its border sooner or later and finalise the issue eventually.
Turkey, although more stable than most other Middle Eastern countries, still has problems developing a more stable democracy, to which they aspire. Its relationship with the Kurds and the Iraqi border is another issue at stake. Until those issues are finalised, it will be hard to focus more on internal issues because they are an immediate security risk.
Geographical borders will need to be covered first in order to stabilise regimes and political situations within many countries. It looks like more and more countries are recognising the correlation between stable borders and stable governments. Nevertheless, the economic expansion of many multinational corporations from all over the world brings instability as well (to be discussed in part 2 later this week).
Conclusion
There are many unresolved border and territorial disputes all over the world. After seeing many conflicts spring up between neighbours in recent years after the fall of the Soviet Union, borders have become key issues in certain regions. In recent years many conflicts and disputes have escalated to new levels primarily because many nations are not willing to look into the issues and would rather just keep at proving that they are right. Although it seems logical, nations need to compromise and resolve these issues because unstable borders nearly always lead to unstable governments and internal politics.
It is a benefit to all to find solutions to these problems in order to bring about more order within a nation. 2009 will be the founding year for nation defining their national borders and securing them in order to bring about order with regard to domestic politics.
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