A country is a distinct area of land in the world with a government that functions as a sovereign state, an unrecognized state, a constituent country, or a dependent territory. A country may consist of multiple nations, a structure known as a multinational state. Countries are often distinguished as developing countries or developed countries. There is no universal agreement on the number of "countries" in the world. This ambiguity is a result of several countries not being recognized as sovereign states by the UN system, but are recognized by at least one UN member, known as "diplomatic recognition'. These countries often have disputed territories and have only partial recognition. A number of entities without recognition are also commonly considered a country.
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