“It is clearly unreasonable to expect all disputing couples to behave like the Czechs and the Slovaks [who peacefully separated in 1993]. But is it reasonable in this day and age to set treat secession as somehow worse than unwilling union?
“Countries and territories change. For one reason or another, the ethnic or religious mix shifts; technological advances may dictate a sharp rise or fall in economic fortunes. Why should state borders not be subject to pragmatic fluctuation, too?
“Is it not ... where demographic change has been acute, and where many colonial-era borders already rode roughshod over older allegiances, that an adjustment of the border, or even the creation of a new sovereign state, might discourage a resort to force?
“Ending this taboo [about frontiers] would enhance, rather than detract from, international stability.”
- Mary Dejevsky, editorial writer and a columnist at The Independent. See the full text of her op-ed here.
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