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Republiken Åland
Republic of Aaland
Flag of Åland
Languages  
  Official Swedish
  Other
Capital: Mariehamn
President Martti Ahtisaari
Vice President Olof Salmén
Premier Viveka Eriksson (Liberalerna)
Area: 13,517 km²
Population 20,000 inhabitants
Established: 1921
Currency: Nordic Crown (NUK)


Åland ([ˈoːland]; Finnish Ahvenanmaa) is an island Republic in the Baltic Sea that forms part of the Nordic Union. The islands are situated at the entrance to the Gulf of Bothnia. Åland was formerly part of Finland. It is one of the smallest nations in the world, only about 0.49% of Finland's de jure land area.

Geography

The islands consist of the main island Fasta Åland (literally "Firm Åland"), where 90% of the population resides, and an archipelago to the east that consists of over 6,500 skerries and islands. Fasta Åland is separated from the coast of Sweden by 38 kilometres (24 mi) of open water to the west. In the east, the Åland archipelago is virtually contiguous with the Finnish Archipelago Sea. Åland's only land border is located on the uninhabited skerry of Märket, which it shares with Sweden.

History

Pre-Doomsday

Åland was part of the ancient Kingdom of Sweden, though administratively it was linked with Turku in the seventeenth century. In 1809, Russia defeated Sweden in the Napoleonic Wars and seized all of Finland. Åland was included in this cession and was considered strategically important: it was said that "Russia would not take a trunk without the keys."

Åland was demilitarized in 1856 as part of the settlement ending the Crimean War. Nevertheless, the islands were used as a submarine base during World War I. As both Russia and Finland fell into civil war, Ålanders petitioned for annexation to Sweden. The new Finnish government offered the islands autonomous status within the new Republic of Finland, which the Ålanders rejected. The question was deferred to the League of Nations in 1921, which sided with Finland but forced them to guarantee Åland wide autonomy: it was to be fully self-governing, neutral, demilitarized, and would have Swedish as its sole official language.

Over the course of the twentieth century Åland began to develop an identity of its own, shaped by its years as an autonomous part of Finland. In 1970 the Nordic Council voted to allow Åland to send its own representatives as part of the Finnish delegation, a step on its way to being recognized as a separate "Nordic nation."

Doomsday and Aftermath

The Aland Islands, as a neutral region, were spared from the nuclear onslaught. However, Finland soon collapsed into violence as thousands of Soviet citizens desperately fled for the Finnish border, and riots and hysteria engulfed Helsinki and other cities. Åland was occupied by a radical anticommunist faction that had emerged in the area around Turku. The group saw the islands' advantages as an offshore base. Claiming to be the legitimate government of Finland, the group installed its own Governor but did not abolish local self-government. In 1987 the faction accepted the authority of Finland's new transitional government, but a splinter group of diehards remained in control of Åland and parts of the mainland to the north of Turku.

Sweden, somewhat opportunistically, sent an expedition to Åland late in 1987 to keep the peace. The Swedes installed a friendly executive and soon after the government announced that it would "provisionally" re-annex Åland "as an emergency measure." However, the islands remained difficult for the resource-strapped Swedish government to defend. By 1990 Åland was claimed by Sweden and Finland but largely on its own. It had become a rather notorious base for pirates who preyed on the slowly reviving local trade on the Baltic. Despite these challenges, Åland's elected legislature continued to administer the islands and do what it could to maintain the peace.

The Nordic Union and the Åland Question

When the Nordic Union was formed in 1990, Åland was a major point of tension between the struggling governments of Sweden and Finland. The other Nordic countries supported Finland and would not acknowledge Sweden's annexation of the islands, but Sweden, being in much better shape than Finland, used the promise of aid to apply pressure. Complicating matters still more were representatives from Åland's own elected government, who asked for complete independence on the basis of the islands' "abandonment" by Finland, and using their earlier membership in the Nordic Council as a precedent.

A compromise was reached in mid-1990 in the lead-up to the NU's creation. Finland agreed to give Åland still more autonomy, making it a fully sovereign republic. As a nod to history the President of Finland would remain the official head of state (represented by a local Vice President along the lines of an old Commonwealth of Nations Governor-General), but Åland would conduct its own foreign policy and would operate outside the authority of the Finnish Parliament in almost all cases.

Seeking Stability

Åland was seated as an NU member in the First Expansion on September 26, 1991. Despite this diplomatic recognition, the islands remained dangerous and wild. With its thousands of islands, Åland remained an attractive base for pirates. Restoring the rule of law, and rebuilding the shattered welfare state, remained the chief concerns of the government for most of the next two decades. A joint Swedish-Norwegian-Icelandic fleet helped dislodge a major pirate base in 2002, so that today piracy in the islands is mostly a small-time law enforcement problem.

Economically, Åland's entrance into the Nordic Union common market proved a great blessing. Though much of the population continues to rely on subsistence fishing and small-scale farming, the islands have revived greatly from the "dark age" of the 80s and early 90s. Some small-scale industry (carpentry, metallurgy) reappeared, but mostly Ålanders returned to doing what they had always been best at: shipping on the Baltic. Ålandic ships are active throughout the sea, in northern Germany and in surviving coastal villages of Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland, as well as in the Nordic nations.

Government and Politics

The President of Finland is Åland's head of state; the arrangement is modeled on the personal union joining Denmark to its former Atlantic colonies. The President appoints Åland's local Vice President to lead the state in his absence. Real power is vested in the Lagting, a parliament that dates to 1922. The Lagting chooses a Premier to lead the government, as well as a Speaker.

Åland sends three members to the Nordic Law Thing (Nordiske Lagting). Out of tradition, they are seated with the Finnish delegation. Åland has three major political parties: Liberalerna (liberal), Åländsk Center (centrist), and the Socialdemokrater (socialist).

Åland's treaty structure still forbits it to have an actual military, only an armed police force with land and air divisions.

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