Demilitarized Zones In The World

what is a demilitarized zone or dmz for short after the end of world war one the treaty of versailles the main treaty that put an end to the conflict specified that part of the area in which germany had its western borders the rhineland should become demilitarized this rule prohibited the new german weimar republic from deploying its military there eventually it was reoccupied and re-militarized in 1936 by germany in violation of international treaties the plan of the allies then the antant didn't work conflict was not avoided through demilitarization but the reason why this particular measure failed wasn't that it was ineffective it was simply because it wasn't followed in principle and i think in practice when practiced the idea makes perfect sense if an area has a risk of conflict a rule of demilitarization might help to solve it i mean if there are no soldiers in the area where the two countries meet there's no one to fight and today we still have a reasonably large number of demilitarized zones throughout the world many of them a result of previous conflicts attempting to prevent them from restarting or new ones from emerging so in this video i'm going to talk about demilitarized zones in the world today first we have the aegean islands this one has to do with military tensions between greece and turkey these greek islands are partially demilitarized according to the july 1923 treaty of lausanne after the greco-turkish war a war that took place after world war one because greece wasn't given the land the antan had promised it would get from the now dissolved ottoman empire greece wanted a part of eastern thrace as well as a part of the anatolian coast but they were unable to hold it after invading the treaty of lausanne followed the end of the war and among many other things it forbids all naval fortifications and bases and stipulates that military forces on the islands must be limited to the normal contingent called up for military service as far as i know these terms of partial demilitarization remain until today also islands the holland islands in december of 1917 fearing the effects of the russian october revolution finland proclaimed itself as a sovereign state at the same time allenders had organized for their own self-determination it is said that by this time over 90 percent of the island's inhabitants consider themselves swedish the swedes which had previously been eager to recover the islands didn't offer much support to them at that moment due to internal reforms but during the finnish internal conflict they sent a minor swedish naval expedition with a goal of evacuating all under civilians who wished it but none did and so the naval forces stayed on the main island of the archipelago as a peacekeeping force somewhat of a dispute arised between the islands themselves and finland with sweden mixed in between this was one of the first issues put up for arbitration by the league of nations on its formation with sweden removing its troops from the islands the allland island's demand for self-determination was not met and sovereignty over the islands was retained by finland but international guarantees were given to allow the population to pursue its own culture and to make sure that the islands remain demilitarized this was not only to avoid a conflict between finland and sweden but also to ensure that neither germany or the soviet union would occupy the islands and benefit from their strategic position as we can see from these two other articles this one was really cool to learn about because i was able to find the actual scan of the original document staying in the nordic region and also an archipelago there's the case of svalbard svalbard was discovered by the dutch in 1596 who then established one of the first settlements there smittenberg the british and russians also stopped by but then the norwegians took over most of the activity probably due to the convenience created by their geographical proximity first for whaling and then coal mining in 1920 following the paris peace conference the svalbard treaty was signed granting full sovereignty to norway and then in 1925 the svalbard act made svalbard an official part of the kingdom of norway however all signatory countries were granted rights to fishing hunting and mineral resources becoming a free economic zone and also a demilitarized one we did two that start with a so let's go alphabetically next antarctica a lot of countries claim territory on antarctica but all of them agreed to put those claims on hold and allow the antarctic treaty system to regulate activity on the continent and so this antarctic tree forbids military activity in antarctica such as the establishment of military bases and fortifications the carrying out of military maneuvers as well as the testing of any type of weapon the treaty does however provide for the use of military personnel or equipment for scientific research or for any other peaceful purpose i found the scan of the original document for this one too and in these articles we can see those principles are stated another one is the sota and melila border fences despite the end of european colonialism spain still holds some regions in north africa these very small plazas de soberania sota and melila being the two biggest ones there have been a couple incidents with morocco who wants the territories back and perhaps because of these a de facto demilitarized zone exists between the spanish territories and morocco perimeter fences around both cities have been constructed by spanish and moroccan authorities creating a demilitarized zone between them moving to eastern europe we have the deniestar val security zone following the war of transnistria during which transnistrian forces seeked independence from moldova the joint control commission was established on the initiative of russian president boris yeltsin by signing a ceasefire agreement in 1992 the objective of this commission was to prevent the conflict from restarting so they created a demilitarized buffer zone known locally as the niester valley security zone roughly following the outline of the tiniest river 225 kilometers long and 1 to 15 kilometers wide so far it seems to have worked as a conflict has not restarted transnistria became a de facto independent state but remains internationally recognized as a part of moldova and a similar situation was created for the serbia kosovo area the ground safety zone after the conflict which lasted from 1998 to 1999 the kumanovo agreement was signed i cannot tell you enough how much fun i had finding the actual documents that were made at the times it's just so interesting for me to look at these historical documents in this one we can see the united nations letter from the security council about this issue forbidding the presence of troops in the specified area probably one of the best known demilitarized zones in the world is the one between the two koreas following the korean war which took place between 1950 and 1953 an armistice agreement was signed this agreement established the korean demilitarized zone the de facto new border between the two nations the dmz runs close to the 38th parallel north this straight line in article 1 of the agreement also visible here in its original form it states both sides shall withdraw two kilometers as to establish a demilitarized zone to prevent the occurrence of incidents and in point eight no person shall be permitted to enter the territory of either side unless specifically authorized to do so in point nine no person shall be permitted to enter the dmz except if specifically authorized this is the best known dmz in the world 250 kilometers long and about four kilometers wide throughout the end of the 20th century the north attempted to build at least four separate tunnels through the dmz and into southern territory at least that's how i understood this information perhaps in preparation of an eventual conflict but all were discovered by the south within the dmz is a meeting point between the two nations which is called the joint security area near the western end of the zone where negotiations take place in this case there have been some incidents in and around the dmz but at least until now the conflict has thankfully not entirely restarted another one resulting of a previous conflict is the kuwait iraq barrier after the conflict between the two countries ended with the un intervention force the united nations security council approved in 1991 the creation of a demilitarized zone between iraq and kuwait confirmed through their documents resolution 689 the paragraph that determines its creation is in resolution 687 though and we can see it here requests the secretary general the immediate deployment of a un observer unit to monitor a demilitarized zone hereby established extending 10 kilometers into iraq and five kilometers into kuwait from the boundary line the aim of this was to stop military activity at the border although the demilitarized zone is no longer mandated by the council it continues to exist all the way in asia the prayer via temple the private temple is an ancient hindu temple built centuries ago it's located in the preavr province in cambodia when the french left indochina and cambodia became independent in 1954 thailand's forces occupied the temple to enforce the already existing claim that it belonged to them eventually the matter was solved by the international court of justice in 1962 who voted although in a 7 5 vote that the temple did belong to cambodia's territory and that thailand had to leave and return any artifacts they may have taken the icj ruling was based on the border agreement that had taken place decades earlier between french colonial officers and siam they say siam and then thailand had agreed to the limitations at the time and also benefited from certain aspects of the earlier agreement so they had no legal right to now claim the temple area the international court of justice also ordered the creation of a provisional demilitarized zone around the temple to avoid future issues back in the middle east the sinai peninsula in 1979 the egypt israel peace treaty took place following the end of the conflict between the two countries apparently this peace treaty sets a limit to the amount of forces egypt can place in the sinai peninsula parts of the peninsula are demilitarized to various degrees especially within 20 to 40 kilometers of israel israel also agreed to limit its forces within three kilometers of the egyptian border another attempt to prevent a past conflict from restarting on page 41 of the treaty we can read under the terms of peace the countries can agree to special security arrangements such as demilitarized zones and limited armament areas a little further north the united nations buffer zone in cyprus in 1974 following the turkish invasion of cyprus there was a conflict on the island after this conflict a ceasefire was put into effect and as a part of it was the separation of the island into two effectively separate states the republic of cyprus in the south and the turkish republic of northern cyprus in the north as a way of enforcing the ceasefire and its continuity the united nations security council created a buffer zone separating the two states the zone also known as the green line stretches for a hundred and eighty kilometers across the island the turkish army has built a barrier on the zone's northern side consisting mainly of barbed wire fencing concrete wall segments watchtowers amongst other defenses the zone also cuts through the center of kosia separating the city into southern and northern sections this division of the island remains until today and finally the sudan south sudan border is entirely demilitarized or supposed to be after south sudan declared independence agreements were made in 2012 in north sudan regarding the relations between the two states in 2012 both of them committed to implementing a safe demilitarized border zone along the entire border line that separates them however this seems to be the only case on this list in which the agreements have openly not been respected i'm obviously not super informed about this it was the case where less information was available but from what i could find both countries agree to the existence of the dmz along the border both claim to respect it but neither of them does these zones are always demolitionized as a result of an agreement between the nations involved but sometimes they are also completely neutral territories as some agreements not only prohibit either side from exerting military control but also any type of administrative control and sometimes human presence because of this several demilitarized zones have also unintentionally become wildlife preserves since their land is unsafe or forbidden for construction and at the same time less exposed to human disturbances like hunting for instance from the ones we saw the cypriot dmz is apparently an example of that like i mentioned at the start the rhineland is a demilitarized zone that no longer exists here are some other examples of former demilitarized zones a neutral territory was established between the british overseas territory of gibraltar and spain after the end of the 1727 siege the length of the line was defined as being more than two cannon shots between british and spanish forces this one ended in 1908 when the british simply built a border on their side of the neutral zone the military zone between manchuk and china the imperial japanese army conquered manchuria by 1932 and in may of 1933 the tangu truce between china and japan was concluded establishing a demilitarized zone between manchuria then a japanese domain and china the vietnamese demilitarized zone between north and south vietnam was established in july of 1954 as a result of the geneva conference ending the conflict in the region norway and sweden established a demilitarized zone of one kilometer on each side of their border after the dissolution of the union between the two countries in 1905 until it was abolished by mutual agreement in 1993 amongst a few other examples that have existed throughout history so those were a few of the demilitarized zones that exist in the world today and some that have previously existed if you know of any other interesting ones feel free to share them in the comments because i think these cases are really interesting showing us how the idea of a neutral zone between states is usually seen as an effective solution after a conflict as a way of ensuring a ceasefire at the time but also as a way of allowing that ceasefire to last again if the two sides cannot meet the odds of conflict arising are much smaller and the chances of peace maintaining itself as it always should increases thank you for watching this video if you want to subscribe in order to catch future ones leave a comment with your opinions or thoughts and i will see you next time for more general knowledge

Channel: General Knowledge

Views: 377,226

Keywords: generalknowledge, funwithflags, countriesthatdon'texist

Id: F0i7Iktc7pA

Length: 15min 3sec (903 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 05 2021