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![]() | This page was nominated for deletion on 7 January 2014. The result of the discussion was keep. |
Are these actual proposals or is it just an example of "what it might look like"? Most of the suggestions seem reasonable, even though I haven't gone through all yet... however, I guess that now we should make an attempt to find sources for those that are currently listed as "prod" or "AfD". For example: if you look at the link to the Estonian ministry of foreign affairs under Estonia-Albania relations, it presents quite a lot of information, probably enough for a decent article. Now all we need is a few newspaper articles to show that others than the governments of the two countries involved are also interested in these relations. DubZog ( talk) 18:31, 18 April 2009 (UTC) EDIT: I found several newspaper articles about Estonian-Albanian relations, and will soon try to expand the article under question. DubZog ( talk) 18:45, 18 April 2009 (UTC)
There's certainly no rush on Albania, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to get a head start on our next case, Armenia, which is quite a bit more complex. Yes, I've proposed a ton of prods, and I expect some of those will move up to AfD/keep, but my thinking was twofold. First, for many of these, the only assertion of notability was the presence of a (usually small) diaspora community - but these are already documented at Template:Armenian diaspora. And second, the other assertion of notability was recognition of the Armenian Genocide: but that too is noted at Recognition of the Armenian Genocide. Anyway, these will take longer to sort through, so I won't put up Austria for a while. - Biruitorul Talk 23:51, 18 April 2009 (UTC)
AFAIK there was exactly one AfD in which the suspension argument was taken seriously by the closer. The closer was remarkably uncommunicative afterwards, so I felt I had to open WP:Deletion review#Colombia–Croatia relations. -- Hans Adler ( talk) 12:46, 6 May 2009 (UTC)
I put a first cut at a list of stubs needing attention at Wikipedia:WikiProject International relations/Stubs. These are from the serial stub-creator User:Groubani. Not sure what to do about it. May add some. Aymatth2 ( talk) 01:00, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
I just finished merging 45 of these relations articles into one. Ikip ( talk) 02:23, 9 May 2009 (UTC)
Looking at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Argentina–Greece relations, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Greece–Mexico relations, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Greece–Venezuela relations, and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Greece–Peru relations, I am wondering if a compromise solution would be an article on Greece's foreign relations with South American countries from which we merge these articles. As a means of "rescuing" the content per WP:PRESERVE, should we start an article as proposed as a merge location (source searching suggests a unified article might be more "notable" than the individual ones)? Or would it be best to just rescue template the individual articles and focus on those separately? Anyway, I like to think outside of the box as it were and thought I would ask before starting a new article or rescue templating these examples. Best, -- A Nobody My talk 19:15, 8 May 2009 (UTC)
For me this is not a compromise, it is (almost) exactly what I want. For various reasons I am biased against small articles with little potential. Normally I vote for merging such small articles into appropriate bigger ones, but in this case they were mass-produced and I felt it important to give a signal that they are not wanted before someone finishes the project of putting 20,000 mostly boring stamps into an album. (I think it's a problem that "merge" is considered to be technically "keep", sometimes leading to merge outcomes that are ignored.)
Note that I am not gaming the system: I only vote for deletion when an article doesn't satisfy the notability guidelines. "Foreign relations of X" is much more likely to be notable; I would go so far as to say that there should be a presumption that they are all notable. And even if they were not, such articles can easily be made big enough, with relevant information, to justify their existence by WP:Summary style.
Now the reason for "(almost)": In some cases there is a better choice than "Foreign relations of X". An excellent example is Sino-Pacific relations. This article discusses the relations between both the People's Republic of China and Taiwan on one hand, and 14 Pacific states on the other hand, replacing 26 bilateral relation stubs and summarizing two bilateral relations articles ( Australia – People's Republic of China relations and People's Republic of China – New Zealand relations).
Similarly, it might make sense to discuss the Benelux countries together, and certainly some of the Polynesian states. -- Hans Adler ( talk) 21:18, 8 May 2009 (UTC)
Having 180-200 trivial articles is definitely better than having 3,000 or so (but keep in mind it won't be anywhere near 180, as the problem of dozens of stubs per country is mostly concentrated in Europe, with certain exceptions like Argentina), although a) trivia is still trivia; b) this can be done far more neatly in existing "Diplomatic missions of..." articles. See e.g. List of diplomatic missions of Romania - where known, the dates relations were established are included, as well as the locations of embassies, and countries with which relations exist but no embassies. So really, there's an existing framework ready for us to use. - Biruitorul Talk 22:40, 8 May 2009 (UTC)
International relations are not normally one of my priorities and look like a huge time sink, but if I can stop wasting my time at AfD I will channel some of it into merging. The reason I have not done this earlier is that I felt it would be contentious. I think we should not have more than one, or a perhaps a handful, of maps for each article. For example one map showing only the country of focus on the world map. Or the bilateral relations of X could be sorted primarily by continent of the other involved country, and then it would make some limited sense to start each section with a map of X and the continent in question. (Personally I would like this, but I imagine some people would object on the grounds that it doesn't really add much information since readers tend to know where the continents are.) -- Hans Adler ( talk) 10:07, 9 May 2009 (UTC)
Much as I'm flattered that one of my articles is being cited as an example here, I'm a little puzzled as to how, in most cases, articles on bilateral relations can be merged into a single other article, i.e. without the content being duplicated. Or is duplication not a problem? For example, if there were an article on relations between Panama and Sudan, and it were to be merged, that would mean merging it into both "Foreign relations of Panama by country" and "Foreign relations of Sudan by country", correct? Aridd ( talk) 22:35, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
This is a huge job, and should not be rushed. Maybe one way to stop the AfD flood is to be a bit bold, as follows:
With this approach there will be fewer edit conflicts, no loss of the small amount of information in each of the stubs, and the first pass can be completed fairly fast. After that, there is the job of systematically filling in the gaps in the "foreign relations" tables, but less urgency about it. The country pair articles that have been expanded should be left for now, and if they are nominated for deletion they have to sink or swim on their own merit. The ones that survive can be referenced from the "foreign relations" tables. But a "delete" decision should always be interpreted as "redirect" to a "foreign relations" table to preserve the title, which is useful for someone searching for the subject. I would be fine with 19,000 redirects into "foreign relations" tables and 1,000 real articles. Aymatth2 ( talk) 18:50, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
(contries removed)
I will see if I can put them in a graph.... Ikip ( talk) 00:25, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
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I don't know. After a walk and a meal and a couple of glasses of wine, I am starting to think my suggestion was dumb. I was thinking about mechanics of creating the tables, not really about value or practicality of maintenance. One way or another, there would be 40,000 entries that have to be maintained and I find it hard to see who would maintain them. Plus Wikipedia is not a directory. Other web sites are dedicated to managing this kind of table. In a silly discussion about X/Y relations the other day, I pointed to Liechtenstein Visa for Greenland Passport Holder residing in Cook Islands. Wikipedia does not have to be so trivial.
On a personal level, I enjoy trying to salvage these articles. It is interesting to discover if there is much to say about each pairing, and often the result is unexpected - although with some of them there really is nothing much of interest. More seriously, it bothers me when they are deleted, because that raises a red flag against anyone who does have something to contribute and wants to start an article on the subject. It discourages additions to the knowledge in Wikipedia, which has to be wrong. I wish the stubs had never been created (although it amused me to try to salvage a few of them).
How much information would be lost if the stubs were simply redirected to one of the "country X" articles, with the content of the stub (what little there is) simply put into a L4 section in the target article? Redirect Liechtenstein - Mongolia relations to a small section in Liechtenstein, and maybe redirect Monglolia - Liechtenstein relations to a small section in Mongolia. At least it would preserve the title without the red flag, so someone could convert the redirect into a real article without worrying too much, if they had some well-sourced content. I see the end result as:
That way, there might be a bit of duplication of the trivial content, some risk of forking where a section in one article on "Country A-B relations" would have a different viewpoint from a section in a different article on "Country B-A relations", but on the whole the structure would align with normal Wikipedia practices. I am inclined to avoid building structures that may never be used. I don't like special rules and guidelines for the country X/Y relations articles either - prefer to just follow the carefully thought-out, general and highly successful rules that apply to all articles: neutral, verifiable, notable etc.
Not being very helpful. Aymatth2 ( talk) 02:11, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
I tried to create something similar to what Aymatth2 suggests by writing {{ Foreign relations of Ethiopia}}, based on my knowledge of Ethiopian history, politics & culture. It was a stab to not only list subjects which were likely to be notable, but also to exclude articles which were not likely to be notable -- say, Bermuda-Ethiopia relations. I admit that I included a couple that weren't notable -- but I also excluded a few which arguably could be. And for my efforts, the template was slashed down to existing articles without discussion. Twice. So if I am unable to assume good faith to individuals who disagree with me on this matter, that is why. -- llywrch ( talk) 18:26, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
Well, regardless of the merits of your idea Aymatth2, I created the huge tables:
As I was working on this, I started thinking maybe this wasn't such a good idea either. But I pushed on, and there they are. there is one mistake in countries f, but other than that I think they are accurate. What a pain in the ass to make them. Ikip ( talk) 06:40, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
1. Finding all of the relations pages by country:
2. Then search for Afghanistan AFDs (because I am going to ask editors who put these articles up for deletion to request to userfy the articles (undelete them)), for example afghanistan again. (now lists up to 500 pages in search term)
3. Then copy a list like this onto this talk page:
For example, Argentina:
Eventually these entries will be merged on one of these pages: Category:Lists of diplomatic missions by sending country
Thanks. Ikip ( talk) 19:11, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
See Bulgaria below - takes no time. Where to put them? Aymatth2 ( talk) 21:29, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
See the table below for Bulgaria, which could be made a stand-alone article on Bulgaria foreign relations.
It is a simple, mechanical job (see note in previous section) to create a starter table with one entry per existing article on Bulgaria-CountryX relations - takes a few minutes. Then it takes a couple of minutes per entry to check if it is a stub, and if so cut-and-paste the content that user:Groubani painstakingly tracked down, preserving the information. If it is not a stub, just add the date relations started and leave the link to the article that discusses the relationship. Depending on the number of entries, a given country could be "done" in an hour or two. There are only 200 of them, so this would not be a huge job.
The stub content would end up in two tables, one for each country, so there is a minor risk of forking, but that does not seem a real problem. After the job is done, the stubs could be turned into redirects to one of the new table-type articles. Think this is worth doing for accessibility reasons: people will search on the terms.
My preference is to keep the number of columns to those shown, putting information in list format within the "Notes" column, because that is visually simpler, makes the cut-and-paste step easier, and is very flexible. Think this is a pragmatic solution. Aymatth2 ( talk) 15:03, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
I am starting to take a backwards approach to pages from here on out, starting with List of diplomatic missions of Afghanistan, I format the diplomatic page first, then find the pages, then add the materials. Ikip ( talk) 21:23, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
See List of articles for a listing of most all articles.
Ikip ( talk) 05:39, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
Started list in Foreign relations of Greece
I removed the merged information from List of diplomatic missions of Argentina and List of diplomatic missions of Afghanistan because of concerns of long time editors there. I think the important thing is the information is still in the history of these articles, even though they temporarily don't have a home.
I was thinking of merging the info into the Foreign relations of... articles, such as Foreign relations of Argentina and Foreign relations of Afghanistan what does everyone think? I will ask the longtime editors of these articles what they think.
If no one wants this info, we can simply start our own series of articles...but I think this is rather silly to do, as much of the info will be in several places and repeated.
Here are the versions before the reverts:
Ikip ( talk) 14:22, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
Ikp, are you going to duplicate the content into two separate lists, e.g. once into Foreign relations of Afghanistan and once into Foreign relations of Argentina? -- User:Docu
I opened a discussion thread on the main project talk page at WT:WikiProject International relations#Adding .7B.7Bprimarysources.7D.7D to various articles, including Estonia–Luxembourg relations. I started it there, as it's not primarily about deleting or merging articles. 08:47, 23 May 2009 (UTC)
I have started a discussion on formalizing merger edit summaries at Help talk:Merging#Edit summaries, best practice. Flatscan ( talk) 05:31, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
One thing I have thought of today is the word "relations". Well, "relations" can mean "cultural relations," "historical relations," "diplomatic relations," etc. so given the titles of the articles, should they either be clarified to "diplomatic relations"? Or allow for the articles to essentially include sections on any number of different kinds of relations, because technically one can argue, "The article title just says 'relations' and does not restrict it to solely treaties and embassies"? Sincerely, -- A Nobody My talk 16:25, 4 June 2009 (UTC)
Dear all, I'm posting this conversation Talk:Belgium–Mexico relations to get consensus on whether we should include/exclude pictures of leaders/princes/ministers etc in bilateral articles. Here are my reasons why we shouldn't:
LibStar ( talk) 14:06, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
While looking something completely different on the US State Department website, I found this document, which is a list of all of the treaties the USA is a party to with one or more countries. And I mean every treaty: for example, it lists three treaties currently in force between the US & Bhutan (which cover the employment of the dependents of diplomatic officials, the surrender of persons to the International Criminal Court, & an agreement on the exchange of express mail). And I'm sure an industrious Wikipedian could find the equivalent list for many other countries (e.g. a list of treaties for the UK, or Germany, Russia, etc.) Which leads to the following questions:
No, I'm not saying that the discussion over notable bilateral relations be reopened. What I am saying here is that there is a category of material waiting to be mined for use in Wikipedia, much of it arguably notable, but whose use needs to be discussed -- especially before some troublemaker finds it & uses it to ignite another acrimonious argument. -- llywrch ( talk) 17:27, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
See also WT:WikiProject International relations#Bilateral relations - sourcing of treaties. -- User: Docu at 22:11, 9 August 2009 (UTC)
I just discovered this page, which lists (thru a pull-down menu) Ethiopia's relations with a number of countries. It includes a few I was dubious about (e.g. Ethiopia-North Korea relations), while omitting some that do exist but understandably wouldn't be (e.g. Eritrean-Ethiopia relations). However, this page also omits one relationship which we fought a contentious AfD over: Ethiopia-Romania relations. Should this source be used to determine which bilateral articles involving Ethiopia are notable? (And let's ignore the issue about primary & secondary sources: if the MFA of Ethiopia says a relationship is notable -- or vice versa -- then it would take a very tendentious editor to ignore this Ministry's authority on the matter.) -- llywrch ( talk) 20:34, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
Angola, Benin, Bolivia, Botswana, Burundi, Cape Verde, Comoros , Democratic Republic of the Congo, Côte d'Ivoire, Djibouti, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, French Guiana, Gabon, Grenada, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Honduras, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Oman, Panama, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Suriname, Swaziland, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Turkmenistan, Uganda, Yemen, Zambia.
No more merges. If you all feel like you need to discuss this further, feel free to remove the archive section. The last few I was careful to:
Ikip ( talk) 14:34, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
![]() | See Wikipedia:WikiProject International relations/Bilateral relations task force/Articles |
Now that I am back, I will actively work towards finishing merging these articles, and I would love some help. Ikip ( talk) 14:51, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
Ikip, just which articles do you intend to merge? (I agree with Russavia that the relations of a major power with every individual country is appropriate for a separate article, except in unusual cases. Most recent AfDs involving two medium importance nations have also been kept. I do agree with Dahn that the articles should not have been made in the way they have been, but given that they are here we should do the best we can with them. Mass merging projects tend to be disruptive and I think we could avoid a good deal of trouble by prior consensus. Although anyone can do a bold merge, anyone else can revert it, and then trying to merge it again without discussion is improper edit warring. It's BRD, not BRRD. DGG ( talk ) 23:46, 18 August 2009 (UTC)
The recent redirecting by Ikip ( talk · contribs) is a clear demonstration why mass redirecting without discussion is a terrible idea. Some of the poorly thought-out redirects include (but there are plenty others):
No rationale was given for redirecting any of these article or any of the others mass-redirected today so I can only assume the redirect was made on the basis of "I never heard of it". That an editor feels it is somehow appropriate to redirect Egypt-Israel relations boggles me but it does make it clear that short cutting the process by mass redirecting is a disaster waiting to happen. In addition the redirecting seems random and arbitrary. Why for example was Malaysia-Thailand relations redirected to Foreign relations of Malaysia rather than Foreign relations of Thailand? I asked for an answer but none was forthcoming. I suggest all of Ikip's redirects be reversed and consensus sought for each in turn. -- Mattinbgn\ talk 08:16, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
A few months ago we attempted to have a moritorium on deletions. LibStar absolutly refused. The deletions continued.
A few months ago two other editors and I started to merge the articles to foreign relations of... The process was long, taking 2 to 3 hours per country.
Another editor started redirecting these articles a few months ago, three editors complained, so he stopped.
I started redirecting the stubs and short articles this week, after LibStar got me involved again...
I was in contact with LibStar a couple of days ago when another editor notified me that several of my redirects were up for deletion. After a long argument which felt like peeling onions, one layer at a time, LibStar told me that the reason he was deleting those redirects was because they were redirecting to the wrong page. He could have contacted me and I would have changed the redirect, he could have done in in two minutes, but instead, he decided to put it up for deletion. I mention this, because the RfDs are currently at snowball keep: everyone agrees that redirects are cheap. Redirecting these articles means no more AfDs, and snowball keeps for the RfDs.
Matt was notified by Libstar about my redirects today.
Matt voted for delete right after Libstar in two more relations articles Libstar put up for deletion today. As with me, LibStar did not have the courtesy to notify the editors of the AfDs.
I find it really funny that when it comes to redirects, LibStar has had an epiphany, and now strongly supports no articles being redirected. Even supporting the unredirect of one page he now feels are notable, but two months ago voted to delete.
If all of these pages are unredirected, LibStar and editors like him, will start a new round of deletions, as they have continually been doing. LibStar has brought up twice that he has deleted 150 relations pages.
Matt doesn't mention all the tiny stub articles which, if they were not redirected, would eventually be put up for deletion by LibStar or other editors. Redirects are cheap, if an editor disagrees with them, they can reverse them, hardly as contentious or disruptive as AfDs.
Lithuania–Russia relations and Egypt–Israel relations are mere stubs. Matt and LibStar have made no efforts to improve these articles they reverted or add sources. I am reminded of WP:BURDEN which is often brought up in the AFDs that LibStar creates. It goes both ways gentlemen. It is nice for once to be the person demanding another editor show sources, or else. Ikip ( talk) 08:46, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
i just created this page and expanded it quite a bit, but I was wondering if someone can add the image map? Lihaas ( talk) 14:18, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
I noticed somebody had created Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Bilateral relations, but it wasn't working properly. I have fixed it. By the way, it should have been announced at WT:DELSORT. Somebody might have fixed it earlier, had you done that. Pcap ping 09:43, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
Template:Bilateral relations task force Invitation has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at
the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Thank you.
Also, is this task force still active? The last activity on this page/talk page was in May 2010. TheFeds 05:46, 28 December 2010 (UTC)
Hello! This task force is quite important, but it looks like it is not that much active. Is there anyone active here? If does, please, you should respond to me! -- WhiteWriter speaks 10:55, 28 December 2012 (UTC)
A user has insisted that bilateral articles contain country comparison articles such as Brazil–United_States_relations#Country_comparison I have looked at almost all bilateral articles in WP, and these do not appear or were removed. I don't see the value of such tables because they don't describe actual interaction between countries, if people want key facts on a country it is best to visit that country's article. putting this debate here for consensus. so the question is: "do you support country comparison tables in bilaterals?" LibStar ( talk) 00:11, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
There is an RfC on the formatting of the first sentence of bilateral relations articles at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#RfC: First sentence of bilateral relations articles. As previously raised, the "X–Y relations refers to bilateral relations between X and Y..." construct is not in compliance with the Manual of Style. Please consider voicing your opinions there. Thank you. -- Paul_012 ( talk) 04:06, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
currently in bilateral articles, there are 2 ways we list embassies/missions: in intro or separate section, like in Mexico–North Korea relations. putting this out for community discussion. @ Aquintero82: @ Nick-D: @ Biruitorul:, @ Dan arndt:. LibStar ( talk) 00:46, 4 September 2017 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Naming conventions (country-specific topics) has an RFC for possible consensus. A discussion is taking place. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments on the discussion page. Thank you. Pilaz ( talk) 02:30, 17 January 2022 (UTC)
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
WikiProject International relations/Bilateral relations task force page. |
|
![]() | International relations Project‑class | ||||||
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![]() | This page was nominated for deletion on 7 January 2014. The result of the discussion was keep. |
Are these actual proposals or is it just an example of "what it might look like"? Most of the suggestions seem reasonable, even though I haven't gone through all yet... however, I guess that now we should make an attempt to find sources for those that are currently listed as "prod" or "AfD". For example: if you look at the link to the Estonian ministry of foreign affairs under Estonia-Albania relations, it presents quite a lot of information, probably enough for a decent article. Now all we need is a few newspaper articles to show that others than the governments of the two countries involved are also interested in these relations. DubZog ( talk) 18:31, 18 April 2009 (UTC) EDIT: I found several newspaper articles about Estonian-Albanian relations, and will soon try to expand the article under question. DubZog ( talk) 18:45, 18 April 2009 (UTC)
There's certainly no rush on Albania, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to get a head start on our next case, Armenia, which is quite a bit more complex. Yes, I've proposed a ton of prods, and I expect some of those will move up to AfD/keep, but my thinking was twofold. First, for many of these, the only assertion of notability was the presence of a (usually small) diaspora community - but these are already documented at Template:Armenian diaspora. And second, the other assertion of notability was recognition of the Armenian Genocide: but that too is noted at Recognition of the Armenian Genocide. Anyway, these will take longer to sort through, so I won't put up Austria for a while. - Biruitorul Talk 23:51, 18 April 2009 (UTC)
AFAIK there was exactly one AfD in which the suspension argument was taken seriously by the closer. The closer was remarkably uncommunicative afterwards, so I felt I had to open WP:Deletion review#Colombia–Croatia relations. -- Hans Adler ( talk) 12:46, 6 May 2009 (UTC)
I put a first cut at a list of stubs needing attention at Wikipedia:WikiProject International relations/Stubs. These are from the serial stub-creator User:Groubani. Not sure what to do about it. May add some. Aymatth2 ( talk) 01:00, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
I just finished merging 45 of these relations articles into one. Ikip ( talk) 02:23, 9 May 2009 (UTC)
Looking at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Argentina–Greece relations, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Greece–Mexico relations, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Greece–Venezuela relations, and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Greece–Peru relations, I am wondering if a compromise solution would be an article on Greece's foreign relations with South American countries from which we merge these articles. As a means of "rescuing" the content per WP:PRESERVE, should we start an article as proposed as a merge location (source searching suggests a unified article might be more "notable" than the individual ones)? Or would it be best to just rescue template the individual articles and focus on those separately? Anyway, I like to think outside of the box as it were and thought I would ask before starting a new article or rescue templating these examples. Best, -- A Nobody My talk 19:15, 8 May 2009 (UTC)
For me this is not a compromise, it is (almost) exactly what I want. For various reasons I am biased against small articles with little potential. Normally I vote for merging such small articles into appropriate bigger ones, but in this case they were mass-produced and I felt it important to give a signal that they are not wanted before someone finishes the project of putting 20,000 mostly boring stamps into an album. (I think it's a problem that "merge" is considered to be technically "keep", sometimes leading to merge outcomes that are ignored.)
Note that I am not gaming the system: I only vote for deletion when an article doesn't satisfy the notability guidelines. "Foreign relations of X" is much more likely to be notable; I would go so far as to say that there should be a presumption that they are all notable. And even if they were not, such articles can easily be made big enough, with relevant information, to justify their existence by WP:Summary style.
Now the reason for "(almost)": In some cases there is a better choice than "Foreign relations of X". An excellent example is Sino-Pacific relations. This article discusses the relations between both the People's Republic of China and Taiwan on one hand, and 14 Pacific states on the other hand, replacing 26 bilateral relation stubs and summarizing two bilateral relations articles ( Australia – People's Republic of China relations and People's Republic of China – New Zealand relations).
Similarly, it might make sense to discuss the Benelux countries together, and certainly some of the Polynesian states. -- Hans Adler ( talk) 21:18, 8 May 2009 (UTC)
Having 180-200 trivial articles is definitely better than having 3,000 or so (but keep in mind it won't be anywhere near 180, as the problem of dozens of stubs per country is mostly concentrated in Europe, with certain exceptions like Argentina), although a) trivia is still trivia; b) this can be done far more neatly in existing "Diplomatic missions of..." articles. See e.g. List of diplomatic missions of Romania - where known, the dates relations were established are included, as well as the locations of embassies, and countries with which relations exist but no embassies. So really, there's an existing framework ready for us to use. - Biruitorul Talk 22:40, 8 May 2009 (UTC)
International relations are not normally one of my priorities and look like a huge time sink, but if I can stop wasting my time at AfD I will channel some of it into merging. The reason I have not done this earlier is that I felt it would be contentious. I think we should not have more than one, or a perhaps a handful, of maps for each article. For example one map showing only the country of focus on the world map. Or the bilateral relations of X could be sorted primarily by continent of the other involved country, and then it would make some limited sense to start each section with a map of X and the continent in question. (Personally I would like this, but I imagine some people would object on the grounds that it doesn't really add much information since readers tend to know where the continents are.) -- Hans Adler ( talk) 10:07, 9 May 2009 (UTC)
Much as I'm flattered that one of my articles is being cited as an example here, I'm a little puzzled as to how, in most cases, articles on bilateral relations can be merged into a single other article, i.e. without the content being duplicated. Or is duplication not a problem? For example, if there were an article on relations between Panama and Sudan, and it were to be merged, that would mean merging it into both "Foreign relations of Panama by country" and "Foreign relations of Sudan by country", correct? Aridd ( talk) 22:35, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
This is a huge job, and should not be rushed. Maybe one way to stop the AfD flood is to be a bit bold, as follows:
With this approach there will be fewer edit conflicts, no loss of the small amount of information in each of the stubs, and the first pass can be completed fairly fast. After that, there is the job of systematically filling in the gaps in the "foreign relations" tables, but less urgency about it. The country pair articles that have been expanded should be left for now, and if they are nominated for deletion they have to sink or swim on their own merit. The ones that survive can be referenced from the "foreign relations" tables. But a "delete" decision should always be interpreted as "redirect" to a "foreign relations" table to preserve the title, which is useful for someone searching for the subject. I would be fine with 19,000 redirects into "foreign relations" tables and 1,000 real articles. Aymatth2 ( talk) 18:50, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
(contries removed)
I will see if I can put them in a graph.... Ikip ( talk) 00:25, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
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I don't know. After a walk and a meal and a couple of glasses of wine, I am starting to think my suggestion was dumb. I was thinking about mechanics of creating the tables, not really about value or practicality of maintenance. One way or another, there would be 40,000 entries that have to be maintained and I find it hard to see who would maintain them. Plus Wikipedia is not a directory. Other web sites are dedicated to managing this kind of table. In a silly discussion about X/Y relations the other day, I pointed to Liechtenstein Visa for Greenland Passport Holder residing in Cook Islands. Wikipedia does not have to be so trivial.
On a personal level, I enjoy trying to salvage these articles. It is interesting to discover if there is much to say about each pairing, and often the result is unexpected - although with some of them there really is nothing much of interest. More seriously, it bothers me when they are deleted, because that raises a red flag against anyone who does have something to contribute and wants to start an article on the subject. It discourages additions to the knowledge in Wikipedia, which has to be wrong. I wish the stubs had never been created (although it amused me to try to salvage a few of them).
How much information would be lost if the stubs were simply redirected to one of the "country X" articles, with the content of the stub (what little there is) simply put into a L4 section in the target article? Redirect Liechtenstein - Mongolia relations to a small section in Liechtenstein, and maybe redirect Monglolia - Liechtenstein relations to a small section in Mongolia. At least it would preserve the title without the red flag, so someone could convert the redirect into a real article without worrying too much, if they had some well-sourced content. I see the end result as:
That way, there might be a bit of duplication of the trivial content, some risk of forking where a section in one article on "Country A-B relations" would have a different viewpoint from a section in a different article on "Country B-A relations", but on the whole the structure would align with normal Wikipedia practices. I am inclined to avoid building structures that may never be used. I don't like special rules and guidelines for the country X/Y relations articles either - prefer to just follow the carefully thought-out, general and highly successful rules that apply to all articles: neutral, verifiable, notable etc.
Not being very helpful. Aymatth2 ( talk) 02:11, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
I tried to create something similar to what Aymatth2 suggests by writing {{ Foreign relations of Ethiopia}}, based on my knowledge of Ethiopian history, politics & culture. It was a stab to not only list subjects which were likely to be notable, but also to exclude articles which were not likely to be notable -- say, Bermuda-Ethiopia relations. I admit that I included a couple that weren't notable -- but I also excluded a few which arguably could be. And for my efforts, the template was slashed down to existing articles without discussion. Twice. So if I am unable to assume good faith to individuals who disagree with me on this matter, that is why. -- llywrch ( talk) 18:26, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
Well, regardless of the merits of your idea Aymatth2, I created the huge tables:
As I was working on this, I started thinking maybe this wasn't such a good idea either. But I pushed on, and there they are. there is one mistake in countries f, but other than that I think they are accurate. What a pain in the ass to make them. Ikip ( talk) 06:40, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
1. Finding all of the relations pages by country:
2. Then search for Afghanistan AFDs (because I am going to ask editors who put these articles up for deletion to request to userfy the articles (undelete them)), for example afghanistan again. (now lists up to 500 pages in search term)
3. Then copy a list like this onto this talk page:
For example, Argentina:
Eventually these entries will be merged on one of these pages: Category:Lists of diplomatic missions by sending country
Thanks. Ikip ( talk) 19:11, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
See Bulgaria below - takes no time. Where to put them? Aymatth2 ( talk) 21:29, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
See the table below for Bulgaria, which could be made a stand-alone article on Bulgaria foreign relations.
It is a simple, mechanical job (see note in previous section) to create a starter table with one entry per existing article on Bulgaria-CountryX relations - takes a few minutes. Then it takes a couple of minutes per entry to check if it is a stub, and if so cut-and-paste the content that user:Groubani painstakingly tracked down, preserving the information. If it is not a stub, just add the date relations started and leave the link to the article that discusses the relationship. Depending on the number of entries, a given country could be "done" in an hour or two. There are only 200 of them, so this would not be a huge job.
The stub content would end up in two tables, one for each country, so there is a minor risk of forking, but that does not seem a real problem. After the job is done, the stubs could be turned into redirects to one of the new table-type articles. Think this is worth doing for accessibility reasons: people will search on the terms.
My preference is to keep the number of columns to those shown, putting information in list format within the "Notes" column, because that is visually simpler, makes the cut-and-paste step easier, and is very flexible. Think this is a pragmatic solution. Aymatth2 ( talk) 15:03, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
I am starting to take a backwards approach to pages from here on out, starting with List of diplomatic missions of Afghanistan, I format the diplomatic page first, then find the pages, then add the materials. Ikip ( talk) 21:23, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
See List of articles for a listing of most all articles.
Ikip ( talk) 05:39, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
Started list in Foreign relations of Greece
I removed the merged information from List of diplomatic missions of Argentina and List of diplomatic missions of Afghanistan because of concerns of long time editors there. I think the important thing is the information is still in the history of these articles, even though they temporarily don't have a home.
I was thinking of merging the info into the Foreign relations of... articles, such as Foreign relations of Argentina and Foreign relations of Afghanistan what does everyone think? I will ask the longtime editors of these articles what they think.
If no one wants this info, we can simply start our own series of articles...but I think this is rather silly to do, as much of the info will be in several places and repeated.
Here are the versions before the reverts:
Ikip ( talk) 14:22, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
Ikp, are you going to duplicate the content into two separate lists, e.g. once into Foreign relations of Afghanistan and once into Foreign relations of Argentina? -- User:Docu
I opened a discussion thread on the main project talk page at WT:WikiProject International relations#Adding .7B.7Bprimarysources.7D.7D to various articles, including Estonia–Luxembourg relations. I started it there, as it's not primarily about deleting or merging articles. 08:47, 23 May 2009 (UTC)
I have started a discussion on formalizing merger edit summaries at Help talk:Merging#Edit summaries, best practice. Flatscan ( talk) 05:31, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
One thing I have thought of today is the word "relations". Well, "relations" can mean "cultural relations," "historical relations," "diplomatic relations," etc. so given the titles of the articles, should they either be clarified to "diplomatic relations"? Or allow for the articles to essentially include sections on any number of different kinds of relations, because technically one can argue, "The article title just says 'relations' and does not restrict it to solely treaties and embassies"? Sincerely, -- A Nobody My talk 16:25, 4 June 2009 (UTC)
Dear all, I'm posting this conversation Talk:Belgium–Mexico relations to get consensus on whether we should include/exclude pictures of leaders/princes/ministers etc in bilateral articles. Here are my reasons why we shouldn't:
LibStar ( talk) 14:06, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
While looking something completely different on the US State Department website, I found this document, which is a list of all of the treaties the USA is a party to with one or more countries. And I mean every treaty: for example, it lists three treaties currently in force between the US & Bhutan (which cover the employment of the dependents of diplomatic officials, the surrender of persons to the International Criminal Court, & an agreement on the exchange of express mail). And I'm sure an industrious Wikipedian could find the equivalent list for many other countries (e.g. a list of treaties for the UK, or Germany, Russia, etc.) Which leads to the following questions:
No, I'm not saying that the discussion over notable bilateral relations be reopened. What I am saying here is that there is a category of material waiting to be mined for use in Wikipedia, much of it arguably notable, but whose use needs to be discussed -- especially before some troublemaker finds it & uses it to ignite another acrimonious argument. -- llywrch ( talk) 17:27, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
See also WT:WikiProject International relations#Bilateral relations - sourcing of treaties. -- User: Docu at 22:11, 9 August 2009 (UTC)
I just discovered this page, which lists (thru a pull-down menu) Ethiopia's relations with a number of countries. It includes a few I was dubious about (e.g. Ethiopia-North Korea relations), while omitting some that do exist but understandably wouldn't be (e.g. Eritrean-Ethiopia relations). However, this page also omits one relationship which we fought a contentious AfD over: Ethiopia-Romania relations. Should this source be used to determine which bilateral articles involving Ethiopia are notable? (And let's ignore the issue about primary & secondary sources: if the MFA of Ethiopia says a relationship is notable -- or vice versa -- then it would take a very tendentious editor to ignore this Ministry's authority on the matter.) -- llywrch ( talk) 20:34, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
Angola, Benin, Bolivia, Botswana, Burundi, Cape Verde, Comoros , Democratic Republic of the Congo, Côte d'Ivoire, Djibouti, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, French Guiana, Gabon, Grenada, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Honduras, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Oman, Panama, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Suriname, Swaziland, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Turkmenistan, Uganda, Yemen, Zambia.
No more merges. If you all feel like you need to discuss this further, feel free to remove the archive section. The last few I was careful to:
Ikip ( talk) 14:34, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
![]() | See Wikipedia:WikiProject International relations/Bilateral relations task force/Articles |
Now that I am back, I will actively work towards finishing merging these articles, and I would love some help. Ikip ( talk) 14:51, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
Ikip, just which articles do you intend to merge? (I agree with Russavia that the relations of a major power with every individual country is appropriate for a separate article, except in unusual cases. Most recent AfDs involving two medium importance nations have also been kept. I do agree with Dahn that the articles should not have been made in the way they have been, but given that they are here we should do the best we can with them. Mass merging projects tend to be disruptive and I think we could avoid a good deal of trouble by prior consensus. Although anyone can do a bold merge, anyone else can revert it, and then trying to merge it again without discussion is improper edit warring. It's BRD, not BRRD. DGG ( talk ) 23:46, 18 August 2009 (UTC)
The recent redirecting by Ikip ( talk · contribs) is a clear demonstration why mass redirecting without discussion is a terrible idea. Some of the poorly thought-out redirects include (but there are plenty others):
No rationale was given for redirecting any of these article or any of the others mass-redirected today so I can only assume the redirect was made on the basis of "I never heard of it". That an editor feels it is somehow appropriate to redirect Egypt-Israel relations boggles me but it does make it clear that short cutting the process by mass redirecting is a disaster waiting to happen. In addition the redirecting seems random and arbitrary. Why for example was Malaysia-Thailand relations redirected to Foreign relations of Malaysia rather than Foreign relations of Thailand? I asked for an answer but none was forthcoming. I suggest all of Ikip's redirects be reversed and consensus sought for each in turn. -- Mattinbgn\ talk 08:16, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
A few months ago we attempted to have a moritorium on deletions. LibStar absolutly refused. The deletions continued.
A few months ago two other editors and I started to merge the articles to foreign relations of... The process was long, taking 2 to 3 hours per country.
Another editor started redirecting these articles a few months ago, three editors complained, so he stopped.
I started redirecting the stubs and short articles this week, after LibStar got me involved again...
I was in contact with LibStar a couple of days ago when another editor notified me that several of my redirects were up for deletion. After a long argument which felt like peeling onions, one layer at a time, LibStar told me that the reason he was deleting those redirects was because they were redirecting to the wrong page. He could have contacted me and I would have changed the redirect, he could have done in in two minutes, but instead, he decided to put it up for deletion. I mention this, because the RfDs are currently at snowball keep: everyone agrees that redirects are cheap. Redirecting these articles means no more AfDs, and snowball keeps for the RfDs.
Matt was notified by Libstar about my redirects today.
Matt voted for delete right after Libstar in two more relations articles Libstar put up for deletion today. As with me, LibStar did not have the courtesy to notify the editors of the AfDs.
I find it really funny that when it comes to redirects, LibStar has had an epiphany, and now strongly supports no articles being redirected. Even supporting the unredirect of one page he now feels are notable, but two months ago voted to delete.
If all of these pages are unredirected, LibStar and editors like him, will start a new round of deletions, as they have continually been doing. LibStar has brought up twice that he has deleted 150 relations pages.
Matt doesn't mention all the tiny stub articles which, if they were not redirected, would eventually be put up for deletion by LibStar or other editors. Redirects are cheap, if an editor disagrees with them, they can reverse them, hardly as contentious or disruptive as AfDs.
Lithuania–Russia relations and Egypt–Israel relations are mere stubs. Matt and LibStar have made no efforts to improve these articles they reverted or add sources. I am reminded of WP:BURDEN which is often brought up in the AFDs that LibStar creates. It goes both ways gentlemen. It is nice for once to be the person demanding another editor show sources, or else. Ikip ( talk) 08:46, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
i just created this page and expanded it quite a bit, but I was wondering if someone can add the image map? Lihaas ( talk) 14:18, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
I noticed somebody had created Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Bilateral relations, but it wasn't working properly. I have fixed it. By the way, it should have been announced at WT:DELSORT. Somebody might have fixed it earlier, had you done that. Pcap ping 09:43, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
Template:Bilateral relations task force Invitation has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at
the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Thank you.
Also, is this task force still active? The last activity on this page/talk page was in May 2010. TheFeds 05:46, 28 December 2010 (UTC)
Hello! This task force is quite important, but it looks like it is not that much active. Is there anyone active here? If does, please, you should respond to me! -- WhiteWriter speaks 10:55, 28 December 2012 (UTC)
A user has insisted that bilateral articles contain country comparison articles such as Brazil–United_States_relations#Country_comparison I have looked at almost all bilateral articles in WP, and these do not appear or were removed. I don't see the value of such tables because they don't describe actual interaction between countries, if people want key facts on a country it is best to visit that country's article. putting this debate here for consensus. so the question is: "do you support country comparison tables in bilaterals?" LibStar ( talk) 00:11, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
There is an RfC on the formatting of the first sentence of bilateral relations articles at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#RfC: First sentence of bilateral relations articles. As previously raised, the "X–Y relations refers to bilateral relations between X and Y..." construct is not in compliance with the Manual of Style. Please consider voicing your opinions there. Thank you. -- Paul_012 ( talk) 04:06, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
currently in bilateral articles, there are 2 ways we list embassies/missions: in intro or separate section, like in Mexico–North Korea relations. putting this out for community discussion. @ Aquintero82: @ Nick-D: @ Biruitorul:, @ Dan arndt:. LibStar ( talk) 00:46, 4 September 2017 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Naming conventions (country-specific topics) has an RFC for possible consensus. A discussion is taking place. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments on the discussion page. Thank you. Pilaz ( talk) 02:30, 17 January 2022 (UTC)