On Tue, 8 Jan 2008 19:46:22 +0000, Tom Anderson
wrote:

On Tue, 8 Jan 2008, Charles Ellson wrote:

On Tue, 08 Jan 2008 12:46:16 GMT, "Richard J."
wrote:

Arthur Figgis wrote:
Charles Ellson wrote:
On Mon, 07 Jan 2008 16:51:57 GMT, "www.waspies.net"
wrote:

Who are the Hillingdon English Democrats...POWER TO THE
PEOPLEEEEEEEE!
Another variation on UKIP ? Apparently some bloke called Gary
Bushell is their candidate for the Mayoralty of Greater London :-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Democrats
which seems to mention desires on the territory of a neighbouring
country, a policy which largely fell out of favour in the rest of
Europe about 1938.

Spain, Ireland and various Balkan places at least have laid claim to
territory since then, and Russia has annexed territory.

Not forgetting the UK's annexation of territory in September 1955, "the
final territorial expansion of the British Empire" according to
Wikipedia. (The territory was the island of Rockall.)

It was for practical purposes only a paperwork annexation which was also
attempted by Iceland and the Irish Republic. These claims have all been
declared invalid by the United Nations

I don't think that's true. Can you cite a source for that?

The disputing countries seem to have acknowledged the International
Convention on the Law of the Sea (a UN device) by ratifying the
relevant treaties rather than "going to court" over the matter.

http://www.gpuk.org/atlantic/press/c...29courier.html
has an undated reference

http://www.gpuk.org/atlantic/politics/c_report.html
refers to the "competing claims" as of Sept 1996, apparently as yet to
be decided.

http://iclq.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/reprint/46/4/761.pdf has:-
"ON 21 July 1997 the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary announced
the United Kingdom's decision to accede to the United Nations
Convention on the Law of the Sea ("the Convention"), a decision which
was acted upon four days later in New York."
Rockall has six mentions in the text.

Consequential changes were made to UK fishing limits by S.I.1997/1750
which removed Rockall as a measurement point and replaced it with
St.Kilda.


as it is not recognised as habitable land despite the efforts of an
ex-SAS man who camped on the rock for a few weeks.

You're right about it not being habitable, and despite the SAS camping
trip, i don't think anybody claims it is, even the UK. As an uninhabitable
rock, it has no effect on the allocation of exclusive economic zones or
continental shelf rights, and so nobody really cares who actually owns it.
Britain annexed because of the rocket testing thing. Furthermore, AIUI,
Rockall just falls within the UK's EEZ, and so it gets too look after it
in terms of mining, ecological protection, etc.

St. Kilda trumps Donegal for the EEZ measurement AFAICT although ISTR
there might be a certain amount of mutually-agreed straight-line
drawing of the UK-IRL boundary for the sake of simplicity.