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The whole Liberland micronation project was just a ridiculous publicity stunt and scam from the start. 1. The "unclaimed territory" story is a blatant lie. 2.

by nsajko 3y ago

The whole Liberland micronation project was just a ridiculous publicity stunt and scam from the start. 1. The "unclaimed territory" story is a blatant lie. 2. The land in question (Gornja Siga) is a floodplain. It gets completely flooded with water multiple meters deep every couple of years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberland EDIT: > Define "scam"? Who is trying to scam who in this situation? Jedlička sold quite a few Liberland "citizenships".

acadapter 3y ago
It is unclaimed if you choose to accept both the Croatian and Serbian border definitions at the same time (which they apparently have done)
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- tptacek 3y ago
  Without dignifying any of this supremely silly drama, that's not an option that logically avails. Both Serbia and Croatia agree that one of them is getting this territory.
  - yreg 3y ago
    Neither of them claim it. Why is their opinion on land they do not claim relevant? (Other than because of force.)
    - kramler 3y ago
      Croatia asserts its right to administer the patch through the simple expedient of actually administering it. The fact that Croatia claims to only be controlling access and evicting squatters on behalf of Serbia does not change the fact that Croatia is controlling access and evicting squatters. The Liberlanders' claim that the patch was terra nullius was silly from day one. An area is terra nullius if there is no recognized government hoping to run it, not if there is no recognized government that will publicly commit to keep running it forever. The Liberlanders' new claim that the patch is bona vacantia is just completely batshit gaga. Bona vacantia is about private ownership title rather than sovereignty, does not exist in civil law jurisdictions, and when successfully invoked just means ownership of the item in question has reverted to the Crown. We need a moratorium on ancaps having legal opinions until their semantics games become functionally distinguishable from SovCit woo.
    - dragonwriter 3y ago
      There's a border definition dispute where its unclear whose side this piece if land falls on, and where Croatia has decided (and Serbia has acceded to this decision) to administer it until the dispute is resolved. But there's no dispute that either Serbia or Croatia owns it, and it doesn't really matter, as to any third party attempt to set up a state in defiance of the status quo administration, whether Croatia is conducting non-hostile administration of Serbian territory with Serbian consent or administering its own territory. If there's a smudge in the only copy of a contract you can find and you think it called for a 60/40 split of profits from a certain kind of joint activity in your partner’s favor, and they think it called for a 60/40 split in your favor, there's 20% that is uncertain until some reolution is reached, but that doesn’t mean that someone else can just restructure the deal unilaterally to be 40/40/20, which is (but for the actual numbers and the nonfungible nature of land) what Liberland is trying to do.
      - dllthomas 3y ago
        To extend your metaphor, with a big "IIUC", there's a sense in which "neither side wants the land" but that's because there's another term in the contract where the party with the smaller portion on this 60/40 split gets something they both want even more than the 20%. They'd both rather have that thing, but they'd both rather have the 20% than not.
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  Seems like Serbia’s position is that Croatia owns it and Serbia has no intent to administer it given that, while Croatia’s position is that (1) either Serbia or Croatia owns it, (2) it's probably Serbia, and Croatia makes no positive claim, but also won’t force the issue pending international arbitration to clarify the border, and (3) Criatia will continue administering it as an interim matter until the border is resolved. So it seems clear that (1) its either non-ceded Croatian territory being administered by Croatia with a diplomatic choice not to make an affirmative claim without arbitration of the border, or (2) it's by prior treaty Serbian territory, which may or may have been ceded to Croatia, which is being administered by Croatia without challenge to any rights Serbia (and only Serbia) may have.
  - throwoutway 3y ago
    In terms of international law, does Croatian law enforcement performing a court order and making arrests within the land, make this an affirmative claim? Otherwise wouldn't it be an cross-border action?
    - micwag 3y ago
      Technically it is a cross-border action, but neither Croatia nor Serbia are claiming the island so Croatia didn't cross into any other recognized country. Furthermore international law differs from normal law as usually at least one party has tanks.
    - tylergetsay 3y ago
      Its not really meant as a "documentary" but more as entertainment, but a youtuber visited the area under this idea. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jb8T9X5K1AA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jb8T9X5K1AA
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
- HWR_14 3y ago
  You cannot accept both Croatia and Serbia's borders at the same time. Croatia's policy is Serbia has this worse land and they have a better plot of land. And Serbia's policy is they own the better plot and Croatia owns this worse plot. So, neither side claims it, because they both claim a better area. But whoever ends up losing the better area is going to take it.
lolinder 3y ago
Define "scam"? Who is trying to scam who in this situation? The Liberlanders feel more like a LARP group than any sort of pyramid scheme, and it's not like there was any serious risk of them actually receiving recognition and depriving the actual nations nearby of the (as you point out) worthless land. Edit: Replying to people by editing your own post is bad form. It makes the conversation very hard to follow. I fail to see how a Liberland citizenship is any more scammy than any of the other supremely silly things people decide to spend their money on. I'd like to see concrete evidence that people buying a Liberland citizenship thought they were paying for something real.
- leereeves 3y ago
  People apparently took it seriously enough to move there and build buildings.
  - lolinder 3y ago
    Look at the pictures in the article: those buildings weren't ever intended to be permanent structures. They're built with bare lumber directly on unprepared dirt, with no attempt at a foundation, in an area that OP points out is regularly flooded. If Croatia hadn't torn them down they'd have washed away. It looks like a fun project, but I wouldn't consider it evidence that anyone there was fooled by the founder into thinking they could actually live there permanently.
    - petre 3y ago
      Better to build a boat or a floating structure then.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
yreg 3y ago
> The "unclaimed territory" story is a blatant lie. So who claims it?
- the_mitsuhiko 3y ago
  Both Serbia and Croatia agree that one of them owns it.
  - kazinator 3y ago
    Well, that's settled then! On to demolishing people's homes.
    - tptacek 3y ago
      If you build your home in the middle of Yellowstone Park, nobody's going to cry any tears when the Bureau of Land Management comes and tears it down. Don't build your house on land you don't own.
      - gs17 3y ago
        Everybody agrees Yellowstone is part of the US. This would be like part of Yellowstone the US considers part of Canada, while Canada doesn't claim it but manages it.
        tptacek 3y ago
        You’ve described half the legal situation. The other half is that both sides agree the territory is going to end up on one side or the other, and the only reason a decisive claim hasn’t yet been made is that doing so will weaken claims in contemporaneous disputes over different territories. People are trying to play this off as if Croatia doesn’t “want” the territory, but that’s not really it at all. They don’t want to lose a larger dispute. They’re happy to have the land. So: yes, this is approximately “building on Yellowstone” levels of silly.
yongjik 3y ago
> It gets completely flooded with water multiple meters deep every couple of years. Ah, so that was the catch. I have to wonder, what do the libertarians do when their entire nation is meters deep in water? Apply for asylum at the Croatian border? Or did it just not happen so far?
- midoridensha 3y ago
  >I have to wonder, what do the libertarians do when their entire nation is meters deep in water? They pull themselves up by their bootstraps!

by nsajko 3y ago

acadapter 3y ago

It is unclaimed if you choose to accept both the Croatian and Serbian border definitions at the same time (which they apparently have done)

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
tptacek 3y ago
Without dignifying any of this supremely silly drama, that's not an option that logically avails. Both Serbia and Croatia agree that one of them is getting this territory.
- yreg 3y ago
  Neither of them claim it. Why is their opinion on land they do not claim relevant? (Other than because of force.)
  - kramler 3y ago
    Croatia asserts its right to administer the patch through the simple expedient of actually administering it. The fact that Croatia claims to only be controlling access and evicting squatters on behalf of Serbia does not change the fact that Croatia is controlling access and evicting squatters. The Liberlanders' claim that the patch was terra nullius was silly from day one. An area is terra nullius if there is no recognized government hoping to run it, not if there is no recognized government that will publicly commit to keep running it forever. The Liberlanders' new claim that the patch is bona vacantia is just completely batshit gaga. Bona vacantia is about private ownership title rather than sovereignty, does not exist in civil law jurisdictions, and when successfully invoked just means ownership of the item in question has reverted to the Crown. We need a moratorium on ancaps having legal opinions until their semantics games become functionally distinguishable from SovCit woo.
  - dragonwriter 3y ago
    There's a border definition dispute where its unclear whose side this piece if land falls on, and where Croatia has decided (and Serbia has acceded to this decision) to administer it until the dispute is resolved. But there's no dispute that either Serbia or Croatia owns it, and it doesn't really matter, as to any third party attempt to set up a state in defiance of the status quo administration, whether Croatia is conducting non-hostile administration of Serbian territory with Serbian consent or administering its own territory. If there's a smudge in the only copy of a contract you can find and you think it called for a 60/40 split of profits from a certain kind of joint activity in your partner’s favor, and they think it called for a 60/40 split in your favor, there's 20% that is uncertain until some reolution is reached, but that doesn’t mean that someone else can just restructure the deal unilaterally to be 40/40/20, which is (but for the actual numbers and the nonfungible nature of land) what Liberland is trying to do.
    - dllthomas 3y ago
      To extend your metaphor, with a big "IIUC", there's a sense in which "neither side wants the land" but that's because there's another term in the contract where the party with the smaller portion on this 60/40 split gets something they both want even more than the 20%. They'd both rather have that thing, but they'd both rather have the 20% than not.
dragonwriter 3y ago
Seems like Serbia’s position is that Croatia owns it and Serbia has no intent to administer it given that, while Croatia’s position is that (1) either Serbia or Croatia owns it, (2) it's probably Serbia, and Croatia makes no positive claim, but also won’t force the issue pending international arbitration to clarify the border, and (3) Criatia will continue administering it as an interim matter until the border is resolved. So it seems clear that (1) its either non-ceded Croatian territory being administered by Croatia with a diplomatic choice not to make an affirmative claim without arbitration of the border, or (2) it's by prior treaty Serbian territory, which may or may have been ceded to Croatia, which is being administered by Croatia without challenge to any rights Serbia (and only Serbia) may have.
- throwoutway 3y ago
  In terms of international law, does Croatian law enforcement performing a court order and making arrests within the land, make this an affirmative claim? Otherwise wouldn't it be an cross-border action?
  - micwag 3y ago
    Technically it is a cross-border action, but neither Croatia nor Serbia are claiming the island so Croatia didn't cross into any other recognized country. Furthermore international law differs from normal law as usually at least one party has tanks.
  - tylergetsay 3y ago
    Its not really meant as a "documentary" but more as entertainment, but a youtuber visited the area under this idea. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jb8T9X5K1AA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jb8T9X5K1AA
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
HWR_14 3y ago
You cannot accept both Croatia and Serbia's borders at the same time. Croatia's policy is Serbia has this worse land and they have a better plot of land. And Serbia's policy is they own the better plot and Croatia owns this worse plot. So, neither side claims it, because they both claim a better area. But whoever ends up losing the better area is going to take it.

lolinder 3y ago

Define "scam"? Who is trying to scam who in this situation? The Liberlanders feel more like a LARP group than any sort of pyramid scheme, and it's not like there was any serious risk of them actually receiving recognition and depriving the actual nations nearby of the (as you point out) worthless land. Edit: Replying to people by editing your own post is bad form. It makes the conversation very hard to follow. I fail to see how a Liberland citizenship is any more scammy than any of the other supremely silly things people decide to spend their money on. I'd like to see concrete evidence that people buying a Liberland citizenship thought they were paying for something real.

leereeves 3y ago
People apparently took it seriously enough to move there and build buildings.
- lolinder 3y ago
  Look at the pictures in the article: those buildings weren't ever intended to be permanent structures. They're built with bare lumber directly on unprepared dirt, with no attempt at a foundation, in an area that OP points out is regularly flooded. If Croatia hadn't torn them down they'd have washed away. It looks like a fun project, but I wouldn't consider it evidence that anyone there was fooled by the founder into thinking they could actually live there permanently.
  - petre 3y ago
    Better to build a boat or a floating structure then.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]

yreg 3y ago

> The "unclaimed territory" story is a blatant lie. So who claims it?

the_mitsuhiko 3y ago
Both Serbia and Croatia agree that one of them owns it.
- kazinator 3y ago
  Well, that's settled then! On to demolishing people's homes.
  - tptacek 3y ago
    If you build your home in the middle of Yellowstone Park, nobody's going to cry any tears when the Bureau of Land Management comes and tears it down. Don't build your house on land you don't own.
    - gs17 3y ago
      Everybody agrees Yellowstone is part of the US. This would be like part of Yellowstone the US considers part of Canada, while Canada doesn't claim it but manages it.
      - tptacek 3y ago
        You’ve described half the legal situation. The other half is that both sides agree the territory is going to end up on one side or the other, and the only reason a decisive claim hasn’t yet been made is that doing so will weaken claims in contemporaneous disputes over different territories. People are trying to play this off as if Croatia doesn’t “want” the territory, but that’s not really it at all. They don’t want to lose a larger dispute. They’re happy to have the land. So: yes, this is approximately “building on Yellowstone” levels of silly.

yongjik 3y ago

> It gets completely flooded with water multiple meters deep every couple of years. Ah, so that was the catch. I have to wonder, what do the libertarians do when their entire nation is meters deep in water? Apply for asylum at the Croatian border? Or did it just not happen so far?

midoridensha 3y ago
>I have to wonder, what do the libertarians do when their entire nation is meters deep in water? They pull themselves up by their bootstraps!