On Mar 11, 2015, at 22:21, Andrew Sullivan <ajs@anvilwalrusden.com> wrote:
1. ISO decides to deprecate a particular country's two-letter code, because the country ceases to exist.
I scanned the ISO standard 3166-3:2014 (Part 3: Code for formerly used names of countries) which lists four categories why codes by be deprecated. I summarise below (1) Significance change of country name: EXAMPLE BURMA (BU) name changed to MYANMAR (MM) in 1989. (2) Division of country EXAMPLE CZECHOSLOVAKIA (CS) was divided into the CZECH REPUBLIC (CZ) and SLOVAKIA (SK) in 1993. (3) Merger of countries EXAMPLE 1 YEMEN, DEMOCRATIC (YD) and YEMEN ARAB REPUBLIC (YE) merged into YEMEN, REPUBLIC OF (YE) in 1990 (change of both country names). EXAMPLE 2 GERMAN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC (DD) united with GERMANY, FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF (DE) in 1990 (removal of one country name). (4) Obsolescence of country name (A country was gobbled up by an other(s)): EXAMPLE NEUTRAL ZONE (NT); the name was deleted in 1993. The area is now absorbed into IRAQ (IQ) and SAUDI ARABIA (SA). I haven't checked whether this rhymes with Part 1 of the standard. For the moment I don't suggest to do anything with this information but in case it comes, we should probably refer to these source Regards, jaap