The United States Minor Outlying Islands, a statistical designation defined by the International Organization for Standardization's ISO 3166-1 code, consists of eight United States insular areas in the Pacific Ocean: Baker Island, Howland Island, Jarvis Island, Johnston Atoll, Kingman Reef, Midway Islands, Palmyra Atoll, and Wake Island; and one in the Caribbean Sea: Navassa Island. The Caribbean territories of Bajo Nuevo Bank and Serranilla Bank are also sometimes included by the U.S. government, but its claims are disputed by other countries.
Among them, Palmyra Atoll is the only incorporated territory. As of 2008, none of the islands have any permanent residents. The only human population consists of temporarily stationed scientific and military personnel. The 2000 census counted 315 people on Johnston Atoll and 1 person on Wake Island. There has been no modern indigenous population, except at the 1940 census. In 1936 a colonization scheme began to settle Americans on Baker, Howland, and Jarvis, but all three islands were evacuated in 1942 as a result of World War II.
The islands are grouped together as a statistical convenience. They are not administered collectively, nor do they share a single cultural or political history beyond being uninhabited islands under the sovereignty of the United States.
They are collectively represented by the ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 code UM. The individual islands have ISO 3166-2 numerical codes, see ISO 3166-2:UM. The Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) ".um" has historically been assigned to the islands; however, the .um ccTLD was retired in January 2007.
The ISO introduced the term "United States Minor Outlying Islands" in 1986. From 1974 until 1986, five of the islands (Baker Island, Howland Island, Jarvis Island, Palmyra Atoll and Kingman Reef) were grouped under the term United States Miscellaneous Pacific Islands, with ISO 3166 code PU. The code of Midway Atoll was MI, the code of Johnston Atoll was JT, and the code of Wake Island was WK.
The Pacific islands are surrounded by large Exclusive Economic Zones.
Read more about United States Minor Outlying Islands: Airports, Ports, Islands
Famous quotes containing the words united states, united, states, minor, outlying and/or islands:
“The United States never lost a war or won a conference.”
—Will Rogers (1879–1935)
“We begin with friendships, and all our youth is a reconnoitering and recruiting of the holy fraternity they shall combine for the salvation of men. But so the remoter stars seem a nebula of united light, yet there is no group which a telescope will not resolve; and the dearest friends are separated by impassable gulfs.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The admission of the States of Wyoming and Idaho to the Union are events full of interest and congratulation, not only to the people of those States now happily endowed with a full participation in our privileges and responsibilities, but to all our people. Another belt of States stretches from the Atlantic to the Pacific.”
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)
“For a country to have a great writer ... is like having another government. That’s why no régime has ever loved great writers, only minor ones.”
—Alexander Solzhenitsyn (b. 1918)
“In my utter impotence to test the authenticity of the report of my senses, to know whether the impressions they make on me correspond with outlying objects, what difference does it make, whether Orion is up there in heaven, or some god paints the image in the firmament of the soul?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line—the relation of the darker to the lighter races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea. It was a phase of this problem that caused the Civil War.”
—W.E.B. (William Edward Burghardt)