If a country sinks beneath the sea, is it still a country, asks NYT

Rising ocean levels brought about by climate change have created a flood of unprecedented legal questions for small island nations and their neighbors, writes Lisa Friedman in the New York Times.

Among them: If a country disappears, is it still a country? Does it keep its seat at the United Nations? Who controls its offshore mineral rights? Its shipping lanes? Its fish?

And if entire populations are forced to relocate — as could be the case with citizens of the Maldives, Tuvalu, Kiribati and other small island states facing extinction — what citizenship, if any, can those displaced people claim?

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