Succession of states refers to the situation when one state replaces another in the responsibility for the international relations of a territory.\u00a0 This can occur, for example, when a colonial power relinquishes its control over a territory \u2014 as happened in most of Africa on gaining independence from European states from the late 1950s.\u00a0 Alternatively it may happen when a part of a state breaks away to form a new state, as in the case of Eritrea and South Sudan. State succession also occurs when sovereignty over a territory is transferred from one territory to another, as has happened to the Bakassi Peninsula between Nigeria and Cameroon.<\/p>\n
State succession raises particular issues for citizenship.\u00a0 The default rule in international law is that a person should, in the absence of other agreement, acquire or retain a nationality based on habitual residence.\u00a0 Every person who was the national of a predecessor state should have the nationality of at least one successor state. But there are many cases where these rules protecting against statelessness have not been respected.<\/p>\n