His radicalism scared criollo landholders, and Mexico declared independence only in 1821, in conservative reaction to a liberal Spanish government.

ECONOMIST: Millennium issue: Freeing Spanish America

South Sudan took with it nearly three-quarters of Sudan's oil production when it declared independence and the two sides fell out over how much the South should pay to export its oil through Sudanese pipelines.

BBC: President Bashir orders South Sudan border to be opened

Adelina Marku, who speaks for the Tetovo-based Democratic Party of Albanians, a junior partner in Macedonia's ruling coalition government, says that the Kosovars, who declared nominal independence from Serbia back in 1991 and created a series of notional organs of state, had lulled themselves into a false sense of security.

ECONOMIST: Macedonia and its Kosovars

Four republics declared independence during the 1990s, leaving just Montenegro and Serbia.

BBC: Yugoslavia opts to end federation

Planned to consist of 1, 900 policemen, judges and others, it was due to replace the United Nations after Kosovo declared independence from Serbia last February.

ECONOMIST: Kosovo and Serbia