Special territories of members of the European Economic Area
The special territories of members of the European Economic Area (EEA) are the 32 special territories of EU member states and EFTA member states which, for historical, geographical, or political reasons, enjoy special status within or outside the European Union and the European Free Trade Association.
Special territories of members of the European Economic Area
- French
- Spanish
- Dutch
- Portuguese
- English
- Swedish
- Faroese
- Danish
- Greenlandic
- Greek
- Italian
- German
- Papiamento (depends on the territory)
and Territories
2,733,792 km2 (1,055,523 sq mi)
6,114,658
Euro (EUR; €; OMRs, 3 OCTs[a]
and 9 special cases[b])
- Aruban florin (AWG; Aruba)
- CFP franc (XPF; New Caledonia, French Polynesia, Wallis and Futuna)
- Danish krone (DKK; Greenland)
- Faroese króna (DKK, Faroese Islands)[c]
- Netherlands Antillean guilder (ANG; Curaçao, Sint Maarten)
- United States dollar (USD; Bonaire, Sint Eustatius, Saba)
dd/mm/yyyy (AD)
The special territories of EU member states are categorised under three headings: nine Outermost Regions (OMR) that form part of the European Union, though they benefit from derogations from some EU laws due to their geographical remoteness from mainland Europe; thirteen Overseas Countries and Territories (OCT) that do not form part of the European Union, though they cooperate with the EU via the Overseas Countries and Territories Association; and ten special cases that form part of the European Union (with the exception of the Faroe Islands), though EU laws make ad hoc provisions. The Outermost Regions were recognised at the signing of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992,[1] and confirmed by the Treaty of Lisbon in 2007.[2]
The Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union states that both primary and secondary European Union law applies automatically to the outermost regions, with possible derogations due to the particularities of these territories. The Overseas Countries and Territories are recognised by Article 198 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union which allows them to opt into EU provisions on the freedom of movement for workers and freedom of establishment, and invites them to join the Overseas Countries and Territories Association (OCTA) in order to improve cooperation with the European Union.[3] The status of an uninhabited territory, Clipperton, remains unclear since it is not explicitly mentioned in primary EU law and has a sui generis status at the national level.[4][d] Collectively, the special territories encompass a population of some 6.1 million people and a land area of about 2,733,792 square kilometres (1,055,500 sq mi). Around 80 percent of this area is represented by Greenland. The largest region by population, the Canary Islands, accounts for more than a third of the total population of the special territories. The smallest by land area is the island of Saba in the Caribbean (13 km2 or 5 sq mi). The French Southern and Antarctic Lands is the only special territory without a permanent population.
Special territories of some other European countries are strongly connected to the European Union. These are as follows:
Many currently independent states or parts of such were previously territories of the following EU members since the latter joined the EU or, previously the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC):
Most of these territories seceded before the implementation of the Maastricht Treaty in 1993 and the following years, meaning that cooperation like the EU citizenship, the VAT union or the Eurozone did not exist, so it made less difference to be a special territory then.
These were:
The United Kingdom left the EU in 2020. When it was a member, some of its Crown Dependencies and Overseas Territories were partially integrated with the EU.
Additionally in Europe there were special territories in the past that had different status than their "mainland", because of various reasons, but now are part of a member state. Some of these territories were as follows:
The following areas are still special member state territories, but have changed their status. See their entries in the article for details.