A neutral territory is a territory (not a sovereign state) that is not an integral part of any state (neither independent, nor dependent on a single state, nor colonized or under protectorate, nor a concession), and yet is not terra nullius, but is the object of an agreement under international law between at least two parties (usually bordering states and/or their colonisers et cetera) that neither shall establish, at least for the duration of the agreement's validity, effective control over it.
When it is a delimited zone bordering at least one of the partners, the term neutral zone applies. This had been the case in the past for:
- Neutral Moresnet, a 19th-century neutral zone between the United Kingdom of the Netherlands (and later Belgium) and Prussia (and later the German Empire).
- in the colonial era, the neutral zone between Thailand and French Indochina, 25 kilometres wide (roughly 15.5 miles) on the east bank of the Mekong, was placed under French control but formally remained under Thai sovereignty
- the Saudi-Iraqi neutral zone
- the Saudi-Kuwaiti neutral zone
- Antarctica
In many cases, a neutral zone is also a demilitarized zone.
Read more about Neutral Territory: Sources and References
Famous quotes containing the words neutral and/or territory:
“The seashore is a sort of neutral ground, a most advantageous point from which to contemplate this world. It is even a trivial place. The waves forever rolling to the land are too far-traveled and untamable to be familiar. Creeping along the endless beach amid the sun-squall and the foam, it occurs to us that we, too, are the product of sea-slime.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“When the excessively shy force themselves to be forward, they are frequently surprisingly unsubtle and overdirect and even rude: they have entered an extreme region beyond their normal personality, an area of social crime where gradations don’t count; unavailable to them are the instincts and taboos that booming extroverts, who know the territory of self-advancement far better, can rely on.”
—Nicholson Baker (b. 1957)