🇧🇱 Saint Barthélemy

National Flag

Geography & Borders

This country has no land borders.

Introduction & Background

Saint Barthélemy (Template:Lang-fr, Template:IPA-fr), officially the Collectivité territoriale de Saint-Barthélemy,5 is an overseas collectivity of France6 in the Caribbean. It is often abbreviated to St. Barth in French, and St. Barts in English.7 The island lies about 30 kilometres (19mi) south of the Caribbean island Saint Martin,8 and is northeast of the Dutch islands of Saba, Sint Eustatius, and the independent country of Saint Kitts and Nevis.

Saint Barthélemy was for many years a French commune forming part of Guadeloupe, which is an overseas region and department of France. In 2003 the island voted in favour of secession from Guadeloupe to form a separate overseas collectivity (collectivité d'outre-mer, abbreviated to COM) of France. The collectivity is one of four territories among the Leeward Islands in the northeastern Caribbean that make up the French West Indies, along with Saint Martin, Guadeloupe (200 kilometres (120mi) southeast), and Martinique.