WHICH COUNTRIES ARE AT WAR RIGHT NOW?

Peter Apps, Political Risk Correspondent at Reuters

“A lot depends on what you mean by ‘at war’ and whether you include the world’s messy ongoing insurgencies. Libya definitely falls under the ‘war’ category, both as an old-fashioned civil war between rebels and government and as a conflict with outside military intervention. The same goes for Afghanistan. Somalia’s long-running civil war doesn’t look like it’s going to be over anytime soon. Some are worried Syria’s uprising might tip into war in the face of a brutal crackdown by the government. The Ivory Coast briefly returned to civil war this year after a disputed election in November, but that looks to be largely over following the capture of incumbent leader Laurent Gbagbo last month. North and South Korea are still technically at war half a century after the end of the Korean War, but ceasefire still holds. There are occasional artillery exchanges between Cambodia and Laos, worrying diplomats, but it’s not really a war. Violence periodically continues in Iraq, but with US and other foreign forces largely withdrawn it is rarely referred to as a war these days. India, Myanmar (Burma), Russia, Venezuela, China, Russia, the Philippines, Morocco, Ethiopia, Chad and many others have ongoing insurgencies and rebel movements, some of these might be sometimes described as wars, many would not.”

Picture credits: Rex Features and Getty Images

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