Can an international crisis be started over a country code?
That’s what I can’t help but wonder when I read that Kosovo has requested its own country code domain.
Serbia (and it’s powerful backer Russia) do not accept Kosovo’s independence and are not going to be happy if Kosovo does get its own ccTLD. But ICANN may very well issue one if Kosovo meets certain criteria in the months ahead.
Keep in mind, you do not have to be a country in every sense of the word to have a country code. Antarctica (.aq) has one. So does Bouvet Island (.bv) — an uninhabited piece of land in the Atlantic.