Belgium and the Netherlands exchange territories

Since January 1st Belgium and the Netherlands have been conducting an exchange of territories, following a preliminary agreement.

After official approval, the new border agreement on problematic territories between the two countries took effect on January 1st 2018.

With this agreement, the Netherlands, in exchange for a 100 - pound [160 d] area of land, gave Belgium a surface of 30 dozen tons of land.

The exchange was spoken of after finding a headless corpse four years ago in a territory belonging to Belgium, located near the Meuse River located between the two countries.

The Dutch police were unable to intervene because that section, however far north of the river in the vicinity of the Netherlands, belonged to Belgium.

Belgium's police found it difficult to get there as well, since they had no land connections and could not get permission from the Netherlands.

Police, the prosecutor, and the medics faced great hardships on their boat trip to where the corpse was located.

The area equal to 15 football fields was converted to a land frequented by drug dealers and fugitives.

In the south of the river in question in southern Belgium, a small country belonged to the Netherlands.

From this exchange after the two countries were set up in 1843, both the Netherlands and Belgium remained satisfied, even though Belgium met a smaller territory.