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The following is a list of all countries that were part of the French colonial empires from 1534; 490 years ago () to the present, either entirely or in part, either under French sovereignty or as mandate.
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French Africa includes all the historic holdings of France on the African continent. Françafrique. [edit] Map of French colonies in Africa (in green), ca. 1922. Main articles: French North Africa and Françafrique. French North Africa. [edit] Egypt (1798-1801) French Algeria (1830–1962) Protectorate of Tunisia (1881–1956)
Overseas France (French: France d'outre-mer, also France ultramarine) [note 3] consists of 13 French territories outside Europe, mostly the remnants of the French colonial empire that remained a part of the French state under various statuses after decolonisation.
- Legal Status of French Territories
- French Overseas Regions
- French Overseas Collectivities
- French Overseas Territories
- Special Status Islands
- Populated Parts of Overseas France
There is a distinct difference between the way France treats its overseas former colonies and the way other countries (the Dutch, Brits, and Americans) have treated the fall of their empires. Non-European parts of France have a very different collective status than the territories of other countries, such as the United States and the United Kingdom...
France is divided into 18 regions, which are fundamentally similar to what’s referred to as states or provinces in other countries. Of those total regions, 13 are located in Europe (12 in mainland France and one in Corsica). These are collectively referred to as Metropolitan France. The other five regions are overseas regions and have equal status ...
Most, but not all, of the remaining populated parts of overseas France are called overseas collectivities. France currently has five overseas collectivities—each one has representation in the French Parliament and can vote for president, but its status is not quite that of a region. A good analogy for these might be the territories of Canada or Aus...
Let’s talk about France’s position in the south. Really far south. There’s one place in the world considered a French territory in the traditional sense of the word, and that’s the French Southern and Antarctic Lands (Terres Australes et Antarctiques Françaises). This territory is entirely uninhabited and consists mostly of small islands in the Ind...
New Caledonia is a territory that was granted statut particulierin 1998. It’s considered neither a region nor a collective of France. During the 1980s, there was a great deal of violence and political turmoil on the island. That culminated in the 1998 Nouméa Accord, which created a special status for the territory and mandated that a referendum wou...
For all practical purposes, 11 distinct parts of overseas France are populated and can be visited. I’ve personally visited seven of the 11 places on an island-hopping journey of the Caribbean, and I hope to visit the remaining four over the next several years. All of these populated territories are in or border the Caribbean Sea, Pacific Ocean, or ...
- Algeria. Population: 44,758,398. French-speaking population: 11.2 million. Other languages spoken: Arabic, Berber. Algeria has been the largest country in Africa since South Sudan’s independence.
- Benin. Population: 10,879,800. French-speaking population: No firm estimate. Other languages spoken: Arabic, Fon, Yom, Yoruba, Bariba, Fulfulde, and several other national languages.
- Burkina Faso. Population: 18,105,600. French-speaking population: 1.3 percent. Other languages spoken: Mooré, Fula, Gourmanché, Bambara, and 65 other indigenous languages.
- Burundi. Population: 11,178,900. French-speaking population: 10 percent. Other languages spoken: Kirundi. Burundi is one of the few countries in Sub-Saharan Africa whose borders are a direct continuation of a pre-colonial state.
5 days ago · Western Africa - French Colonies, Sahel, Sahara: The problems facing the French were much more formidable than those facing the British. The British colonies were essentially based on territories close to the sea, in which European trade had been long established and whose African peoples were already accustomed to producing for the world market.
French Equatorial Africa, collectively, four French territories in central Africa from 1910 to 1959. In 1960 the former territory of Ubangi-Shari (Oubangui-Chari), to which Chad (Tchad) had been attached in 1920, became the Central African Republic and the Republic of Chad; the Middle Congo.
