Concept
The British Overseas Territories (BOTs), also known as the United Kingdom Overseas Territories (UKOTs), are fourteen territories with a constitutional and historical link with the United Kingdom, but do not form part of the United Kingdom itself. The permanently inhabited territories are internally self-governing, with the United Kingdom retaining responsibility for defence and foreign relations. All of the territories are inhabited by civilians, except three which are chiefly or only inhabited by military or scientific personnel. All fourteen have the British monarch as head of state. These UK government responsibilities are assigned to various departments of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and are subject to change. Most of the territories retain permanent civilian populations, with the exceptions of the British Antarctic Territory, the South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands (which host only officials and research station staff) and the British Indian Ocean Territory (used as a military base). Permanent residency for the approximately 7,000 civilians living in the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia is limited to citizens of the Republic of Cyprus. Collectively, the territories encompass a population of about 250,000 people and a land area of about . The vast majority of this land area constitutes the almost uninhabited British Antarctic Territory (the land area of all the territories excepting the Antarctic territory is only ), while the two largest territories by population, the Cayman Islands and Bermuda, account for about half of the total BOT population. The Cayman Islands alone accounts for 28% of the entire BOT population. At the other end of the scale, three territories have no civilian inhabitants - the Antarctic Territory (currently consisting of five research stations), the British Indian Ocean Territory (whose inhabitants, the Chagossians were forcibly moved to Mauritius and the United Kingdom between 1968 and 1973), and South Georgia (which actually did have a full-time population of two between 1992 and 2006).