Status verified as of 22 September 2026. Political positions change; this explainer describes the documented position on that date.
Current position
Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha remain a single British Overseas Territory with internal self-government, the three islands holding equal constitutional status since 2009. No independence campaign or referendum is documented in the sources reviewed.[1]
Sources for this page
Each number marks a specific claim. Notes give the source, its locator and how it relates to the claim.
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1.
Claim: The territory was named "Saint Helena and Dependencies" until a new constitution came into force on 1 September 2009, giving Saint Helena, Ascension Island and Tristan da Cunha equal status as three territories within a single grouping under the British Crown, and ending Ascension's and Tristan da Cunha's prior status as dependencies of Saint Helena.
- Politics of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha (Wikipedia) link, 2009 constitution and renaming section. Source record
Printed from https://independenceatlas.com/movements/saint-helena-political-status/status · last substantive update 24 September 2026.