Since the 1970s, Canada and Denmark have reportedly been fighting over Hans Island, including removing each other's flags and leaving behind a bottle of alcohol.

In and of itself, the “war” over the island called Hans sounds pretty funny, as it is shown in the following sharepic:

Screenshot by mimikama.org
Screenshot by mimikama.org

Canada and Denmark have been fighting over Hans Island since 1970. Their “war” looks like this: Both countries take turns sending their military to the island to repeatedly raise their own flag and remove the foreign one. The Danes always leave a bottle of Danish schnapps for the Canadians and the Canadians leave a Canadian whiskey for the Danes.

The fact check

The small island named Hans is located in the Arctic Ocean. ( we reported )

With a size of 1.25 km², Hans has no vegetation or any inhabitants. It was named after the Greenlandic expedition member Hans Hendrik. But why have Canada and Denmark been “arguing” for decades about who owns the island?

Hans Island lies directly on the border line between Denmark and Canada established in the 1973 UN treaty. This specifies the exact border between the Canadian “Ellesmere Island” and Greenland (an autonomous part of the Kingdom of Denmark) - unfortunately the island of Hans was not taken into account. To date, no agreement has been reached as to who should own the island.

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So what about the “tradition” of taking down the flags and leaving a bottle of alcohol with them?
Well, maybe the story on the sharepic is portrayed a bit very romantically. Because the exchange of bottles did not happen as often as the text might suggest. Various sources say that in 1984 the Danish military left the Danish flag and a bottle of aquavit behind, whereupon the Canadians did the same, removing the Danish flag and placing a bottle of whiskey next to it.

Also in the book “ Who Owns the Artic? There is a note about this:

“When Danish military go there, they leave a bottle of schnapps. And when [Canadian] military forces come there, they leave a bottle of Canadian Club and a sign saying, 'Welcome to Canada.'”

In 2005, Canadian Foreign Minister Pierre Pettigrew and his Danish counterpart Per Stig Moller tried to “put the problem behind them”:

The crew of the Danish warship Vedderen perform a flag raising ceremony on uninhabited Hans Island in August 2002. Canadian Forces performed a similar ceremony in 2005. The island is midway between Ellesmere Island and Greenland, and both Canada and Denmark claim sovereignty over it.
[ Source: CBC ]

However, there are no other references to regular exchange.

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And how does it look today?
In 2018, the countries convened a joint “task force” to negotiate a more formal agreement than the “bottle swap.” This will be made up of lawyers and experts from various federal ministries and will examine all options for Hans Island, including a proposal by scientists in the mid-2000s that would see Denmark and Canada share ownership.

However, Alan Kessel, legal expert at Global Affairs Canada, expects that a full agreement could take up to 10 years.

Conclusion:

The “bottle exchange” is not really a regular thing. Nevertheless, it actually happened! There are sources that show a bottle exchange in the 1980s and 2000s.

In the end, the bottle exchange isn't all that funny, even if Denmark and Canada try to find a peaceful solution for Hans and at least don't beat each other up. But if it's just a few bottles of alcohol and the other people's flag as a trophy, it's a pretty nice solution. 😉

Further sources: Business Insider , Travel Book , Spiegel
Article image: Wikipedia / Toubletap


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Notes:
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