Islands Divided by International Borders

Islands Divided by International Borders

Island, location	Shared by	Area
Island, location	Shared by	sq. miles or acres	sq km or hectares
1. New Guinea	Papua New Guinea - Indonesia	309,000	800,000
2. Borneo, Southeast Asia	Indonesia - Malaysia - Brunei	280,100	725,500
3. Ireland	Ireland - United Kingdom	32,589	84,406
4. Hispaniola, Caribbean	Dominican Republic - Haiti	28,840	74,700
5. Grande de Tierra del Fuego	Argentina - Chile	18,530	47,992
6. Timor	Indonesia - East Timor	11,883	30,777
7. Cyprus	Cyprus - Northern Cyprus - UK (Note 1)	3,572	9,251
8. Corocoro	Venezuela - Guyana	c. 270	c. 690
9. Sebatik, east coast of Borneo	Indonesia - Malaysia	175	452
10. Usedom / Uznam, Baltic Sea	Germany - Poland	172	445
11. Saint Martin / Sint Maarten, Caribbean	Guadeloupe - Netherlands Antilles	34	88
12. island under King Fahd Causeway	Bahrain - Saudi Arabia	163 acres	66 ha
13. Province I., L. Memphremagog, Quebec - Vermont	Canada - United States	70 acres	28 ha
14. island in Purnujarvi, 61^o15'N, 29^o10'E	Finland - Russia	c. 40 acres	c. 15 ha
15. Hisön	Sweden - Norway	21 acres	8 ha
16. Storoya, Utgardsjoen, 60^o01'N, 12^o25'E	Norway - Sweden	9 acres	4 ha
17. east island in Boundary L., North Dakota - Manitoba	United States - Canada	8 acres	3.3 ha
18. Märket / Märketin, Baltic Sea	Finland - Sweden	8 acres	3.3 ha
18. west island in Boundary Lake, North Dakota - Manitoba	United States - Canada	3 acres	1.1 ha
19. Kulleholmen, Södra Boksjön	Norway - Sweden	2 acres	0.8 ha
20. Tagholm, Södra Boksjön	Norway - Sweden	0.7 acres	0.3 ha
21. middle island, Södra Boksjön	Norway - Sweden	0.2 acres	0.1 ha

Note 1: Northern Cyprus is a Turkish-supported de facto state in the north part of the island. It is not recognized by the international community. Cyprus also hosts two British bases that are under the sovereignty of the U.K. rather than Cyprus.

Special case:

Cuba: The Cuban government does not administer the whole island of Cuba. The United States retains control over the Guantanamo Bay base, at the southeastern end of the island. The border of the base also cuts across Flamingo Cay, leaving about 60% of the small island under American control.

Former:

Vozrozhdeniya, an island in the Aral Sea between Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, had been the 8th largest divided island, at about 900 sq miles / 2,300, but the shrinking of the sea caused it to join to the mainland between June 2000 and June 2001.

It is likely that there are small islands on the U.S.-Canadian border and in Scandinavia that have been omitted from this list.

Thanks to Jesper Nielsen for help in compiling this information.

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Contact Joshua Calder at jcalder@erols.com with questions or suggestions.

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