The Italian island of Pantelleria, and the Pelagie Islands, are on the African shelf, and are geographically closet to the Tunisian coast, but are administered as part of Italy. Sicily is on the edge of the African plate. The remainder of Italy is in Europe, including it's other Mediterranean islands, and we consider it fully European.

The independent island nation of Malta is located on the very edge of the African tectonic plate, but is usually considered as part of Europe in a geographical, political, historical and economical sense. We consider Malta as a fully European country throughout this website.

Whilst the majority of Portuguese territory is situated in Europe, with some African overseas dependencies, the Azores Autonomous Region is actually a group of islands which are situated on the North American plate, 900 miles from Europe and 2,400 miles from North America. We consider Portugal entirely European.