There are more than 190 countries in the world, and there are huge differences in geographical location, land area, population size, economic development level, sea and land location, ethnicity and religion. According to the sea and land location of different countries, we can be divided into coastal countries, landlocked countries and island countries, for example, China is located in the East of Eurasia and the Pacific Ocean, which is a coastal country, and China has more than 18,000 kilometers of continental coastline. Kazakhstan, located in Asia and Central Asia, is the world's largest landlocked country, and Japan, which shares the same water as our country, is an island country.
A coastal state with only 25 km coastline
From the perspective of transportation, railway, road, aviation, water transport and pipeline transport are five important forms of transportation, of which water transport, especially sea transport is the most important mode of transport in international trade in the world today, especially in terms of freight, shipping has a large volume, low price of the huge advantage, through the container ship to transport goods, greatly promote international trade. Therefore, coastal and island states have a natural advantage in maritime transport, while landlocked countries can only transport by land to other countries' ports, and then by sea, and will be subject to people in terms of transport.
Map of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina
Of course, it is not necessarily that there are excellent port conditions along the coast, but the length of a country's coastline will still greatly affect a country's shipping, generally speaking, the coastline is longer, and the possibility of having a good port is greater. From this point of view, we found that there are many countries in the world although they are coastal countries, but in fact their coastlines are very short, today we will introduce a country, that is, the "Bosnia and Herzegovina" on the Balkan Peninsula in Europe, Bosnia and Herzegovina is currently a coastal country, but its total coastline length is only 25 kilometers. Of course, some people say that the coastline of 25 kilometers is not short, you see another country in Europe " Monaco", Monaco south of the Mediterranean Sea, the total length of the coastline is only 3.83 kilometers, Monaco's coastline is much shorter than Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina
We can't look at this problem in this way, Monaco's coastline is indeed very short, but we know that Monaco's land area is only 1.98 square kilometers, which is the second smallest country in the world, and for such a pocket country, having 3.83 kilometers of coastline is actually a high proportion. But Bosnia and Herzegovina is different, Bosnia and Herzegovina is the abbreviation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the land area of Bosnia and Herzegovina is about 51,100 square kilometers, for such a large country, the coastline is only about 25 kilometers, it is indeed shorter. What is even more "infuriating" is that if it is far from the ocean, it is enough, but there are many areas in Bosnia and Herzegovina that are close to the ocean, but there is no coastline.
Bosnia and Herzegovina scenery
To answer this question we need to go back in time to Yugoslavia, once an important country located in the Balkans of Europe, with a land area of about 267,000 square kilometers, and an important ally republic of the Soviet Union. Later, in 1991, Yugoslavia began to disintegrate, splitting into the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (later into Serbia and Montenegro), Croatia, Slovenia, North Macedonia and Bosnia-Herzegovina (Bosnia and Herzegovina). We found that the former Yugoslavia was a coastal country, facing the Adriatic Sea in the Mediterranean Sea to the southwest, and the coastline was very long and winding.
Bosnia-Herzegovina coastline and the port of Nem
At the time of the dissolution of Yugoslavia, various independent states were competing for the coastline of Yugoslavia, of which Croatia obtained most of the Yugoslav coastline, with a coastline of more than 1770 kilometers, the Yugoslav Federation in the south also had a coastline of 293 kilometers, Slovenia in the north gained about 40 kilometers of coastline, and Bosnia and Herzegovina got the shortest coastline, with a coastline of only about 25 kilometers. Beyond that, Croatia's territory is like a hand that stretches in from the northwest to the southeast, separating Bosnia and Herzegovina from the sea. There is a port city "Nem Port" on such a short coastline of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and because of the existence of this small stretch of Bosnia and Herzegovina coastline, Croatia is separated by a small piece of territory to the north and south, making it very inconvenient for Croatia to travel north and south.
Port of Niem, Bosnia and Herzegovina
However, the Bosnian blacks living near the Croatian border are all Croats, equivalent to The Brothers of the Croats, so they are not embarrassed to take away the only outlet to the sea in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Moreover, in the Bosnian War, the Croatian army, together with the Muslim and Croat armed forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina, defeated the Serb armed forces and forged a deep friendship of war. However, ships departing from the port of Nem, Bosnia and Herzegovina, are not easy to get out to sea, and they need to pass through many peninsulas and islands in Croatia to enter the Adriatic Sea. For Croatia, the long-term division of the north and south territories is also very painful, so in 2018 it was finally decided to build the "Pelješac Bridge" across the small Ston Bay in the Adriatic Sea, thus connecting the north and south parts of the country.
Peljesac Bridge (renderings)