Find the answer to a question that seems so simple: “How many countries are there in the world?” not at all simple. Scrolling through various reference books, you can see different data. Even in official data reported over a period of one year, they may differ.
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And the thing is that states not only appear and disappear. Some of them may change their status and belong to different groups, be recognized by other countries or not. In some territories, the status remains uncertain: to consider them sovereign or not is still not clear. And it is still impossible for all states to agree on the same approach to determining their status and how many countries in the world are due to the mismatch of their political, economic and other interests.
The main group is represented by those states that are members of the United Nations and are recognized by all. Considering those who joined this international organization at the beginning of the 21st century, they already number 193. Well, how many states in the world are in all, it is really very difficult to calculate. For example, the Order of Malta, which cannot be called a state, nevertheless has observer status with the UN and maintains diplomatic relations with many countries.
There is one well-known independent state of the Vatican, which is not included in any world organizations, including the UN. Sometimes the same country is called Kosovo. Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Palestine and several other similar territories are recognized by others only partially. And the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic, like Nagorno-Karabakh, is not considered a sovereign by any UN member. There is a unique country Somaliland on our planet - it is not recognized by anyone at all, but, nevertheless, it exists.
Forty-nine territories have their own flags and claim to be called states. However, many of them are located in other countries. Some of the entities have a special status recognized by the international community: Antarctica, Svalbard, Macau, Hong Kong and Aland Islands. All this makes it difficult to calculate how many countries in the world are currently available.
Seven regions (four French, two Portuguese and Hawaii), although they are an integral part of their states, are located at great distances from them, and this does not allow them to be part of their country. Several state entities have no status, and a territory called Sealand has no status at all.
And this is not all the information. To understand how many countries in the world today is also difficult because the process of forming the political map of the world is continuous and very variable. States periodically appear or disappear, their numbers can be called approximately. It can only be firmly asserted that on Earth there are about 200 states that have received international recognition.
It is also difficult to determine how many cities there are in the world and what can be called a city. There is evidence that almost 2.5 million settlements claim to have the status of a city.