evidence: There are also sixteen island territories. France administers ten territories—Amsterdam Island and St. Paul Island, Crozet Islands, Kerguelen Islands, Réunion, Mayotte, Europa Island, Bassas da India, Juan de Nova Island, Glorioso Islands, and Tromelin Island—the most territories administered by a single nation across the Indian Ocean region. Australia administers three territories: Cocos Islands and Christmas Island in the northeastern Indian Ocean and the Heard Island and McDonald Islands in the southern Indian Ocean. Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal is administered by India. South Africa oversees the Prince Edward Islands, just south of the country’s coast. Despite the International Court of Justice’s 2019 advisory opinion, which granted the Chagos Archipelago back to Mauritius, the archipelago remains administered by the United Kingdom as the British Indian Ocean Territory.50 [...] France has several territorial disputes in the western Indian Ocean with Comoros and Madagascar. It has expressed interest in exploring the possibility of comanaging disputed islands and their surrounding waters with Madagascar, while its dispute with Comoros remains a challenge in the bilateral relationship. Despite its record in the South China Sea, China has no territorial disputes in the Indian Ocean.