Levantine Union

The Levantine Union (LU) is a political and economic union of nine member states that are located primarily in Levantia. It has an area of more than 14 million square kilometers, and an estimated population of over 2.5 billion. The LU has developed an internal single market through a standardized system of laws that apply in all member states. LU policies aim to ensure the free movement of people, goods, services, and capital within the internal market, enact legislation in justice and home affairs, and maintain common policies on trade, agriculture, fisheries, and regional development. The Union emerged out of the former Holy Levantine Empire, which provided for a degree of economic interoperability for nearly a millennium. Since 2018, the Union has more actively involved itself in the common defense and military preparedness of its members via the Levantine Union Defense Council. Within the Union, passport controls have been abolished. A monetary union was already in place during the Holy Levantine Empire, and the Levantine Union Taler is the currency of the Union. The de facto religion of the Levantine Union is Catholicism.

The Levantine Union's immediate precursor, the "Istroya Pact", was a common market, open borders, and mutual defense agreement signed in 19XX between Urcea and Burgundie in the wake of the functional end of the Holy Levantine Empire. With the end of the Empire's institutions, the various Levantine states that comprised it suddenly found themselves with closed borders, tariffs, and independent economies. The Pact was intended to last the duration of the Second Great War in order to link the two nations and economies together during the crisis and was not intended to be a permanent institution, but soon became indispensible to both nations. At the end of the war, Urcea and Burgundie replaced the Istroya Pact with the Levantine Union Treaty, signed on June 1st, 1954, joined by the rebuilding and reorganizing Deric States and by Anglei. This treaty strengthened the already close union between the states. On January 1st, 1955, Fiannria joined the Union. Yonderre was later admitted to the union in 1962, being the sole member who was not a member of the Holy Levantine Empire at any point. The Deric States was dissolved in the 2020s and 2030s, consolidating the number of member states to the nine presently part of the Union.

Background
The Holy Levantine Empire was reestablished in the 10th century out of the Southern and Eastern Kingdoms of the Levantines, binding its people and princes together under the authority of the Emperor of the Levantines and Imperial Diet. They reminded bound together for a millennia, but the Second Fratricide effectively brought the Empire to a sudden end in 193X, leaving the economies and political structures of Catholic Levantia in chaos. The Treaty of Corcra ended the Second Great War in southern Levantia and set forth the future settlement of agreements between the former states of the Empire, but such an agreement did not immediately come about as a consequence of the war and the ongoing violence in Dericania known as the Third Fratricide. Consequently, Urcea and Burgundie agreed to the so-called Istroya Pact, which bound the two nations together in common defense, free travel, and a common market. The Pact was viewed as a wartime expedient, but the relative economic stability within the two nations even during wartime lead to widespread political support for renewing and expanding the agreement.

With the end of the Great War in 1953, the Levantine great powers could end the Third Fratricide in Dericania. Decades of war and sudden economic isolation had depressed the Deric economy, necessitating an infusion of capital from Urcea and Burgundie. Given the popularity and success of the program, as well as the obligation under the Treaty of Corcra to settle the Holy Levantine Empire, Urcea and Burgundie began to negotiate what would become the Levantine Union Treaty, which they agreed to on June 1st, 1954, establishing the Levantine Union. The Deric States, which had been founded earlier in the year, agreed to join the Levantine Union in October of 1954 following the conclusion of the Third Fraternal War. Fiannria decided to join effective 1955. With Fiannria joining, the entire area of the Holy Levantine Empire in 1930 had been rebound together under the terms of the Union.

20th Century
The Levantine Union's primary program in the two decades following the Second Great War concerned reconstruction of the Deric States, which had been plagued by more than two decades of war. In 1956, the Levantine Union Diet voted to create the Levantine Union Economic Development Agency, which would use funds from Urcea primarily to rebuild the infrastructure of the Deric States.

Council of State
The Levantine Union Council of State is the central organizing body of the Levantine Union and is responsible for overseeing the operation of its various organs and agencies, ensuring that they are operating within the confines of the laws of the Union and its member nations. The Council is made up of the Ministers of State, or their designee, of each member nation of the Union. The Council of State has limited deliberative powers, which are mostly held by the Levantine Union Diet, but it does retain power to add or remove members by a unanimous vote of its members. The Council of State also selects the Chairman of the Union, a role with limited executive authority over the apparatuses of the Union, who can serve a single four year term. The Chairman of the Union is always one of the members of the Council and serves as its presiding officer in addition to his or her executive powers.

Union Diet
The primary decision-making institution of the Levantine Union is the Levantine Union Diet, where all member-states are represented relatively proportional to their population. It is considered the successor of the Imperial Diet and fulfills many of the same functions, establishing the Union's trade regulations, adopting changes and alterations to the Levantine Union Charter, creating agencies and organs and appointing their heads, ratifying treaties negotiated on the Union's behalf, and all other necessary responsibilities with the exception of deciding membership of the Union. The members of the Diet are elected from each of the member-states during each member's regularly held general elections. Accordingly, members of the Diet serve on different terms, though a majority of members are elected to five year terms due to the electoral cycles of Urcea and some members of the Deric States. The presiding officer of the Diet is the Speaker of the Diet, an officer appointed by the Chairman of the Union and confirmed by the members of the Diet.

Union Defense Council
From its inception, the Levantine Union shared a commitment for common defense and "general military cooperation", per the Levantine Union Treaty. However, the defense functions of the Union were effectively, but not officially, handled by the Levantia and Odoneru Treaty Association (LOTA), which included several Levantine Union members in addition to other nations based in Sarpedon. Following the end of the Occidental Cold War, LOTA's membership was reduced to the member states of the Levantine Union, creating a redundancy. Consequently, in 2017, following the departure of Cartadania from the alliance, it voted to dissolve itself and reform as a similar organization fully within the Levantine Union. The new body, the Levantine Union Defense Council, retained the assets and goals of LOTA while embracing all members of the Union, fulfilling the vision of the initial Levantine Union Treaty.

Global Defense Corollary
The Global Defense Corollary is an agreement among Levantine Union members within the auspices of the Levantine Union Defense Council relating to defense of territories beyond the borders of the Union. The agreement, an "opt-in" signatory agreement, commits its members to a encompassing all overseas territories of the signatory nations, requiring all members to participate in a conflict should a foreign territory or union state of a Union member come under attack. The Corollary only applies to the overseas territories and associated states of those participating nations. Presently, Urcea and Fiannria are the signatory members of the Corollary.

Cort de Antics
The Cort de Antics is a court embedded within the Levantine Union which is responsible for adjudicating competing noble claims and awarding compensation for nobles dispossessed during the Fraternal Wars in addition to other dispossessed nobles. As a consequence of its jurisdiction, the Cort has functionally become the highest court of peerage law in Levantia. The Cort consists of one judge nominated by each member nation; judges are confirmed by the Levantine Union Diet.

The Cort was created in 1956 in order to resolve disputes between member states of the Deric States and deposed Deric nobles in the wake of the Third Fratricide, although the Cort was soon expanded to adjudicating all rival noble claims. The Cort, since its creation, has accrued the world's largest library of ancestral and feudal records, documents which are necessary for determining claims. Throughout its history, the Cort has become involved in several high-profile claim disputes, including a large series of claims of Derian nobles against Burgundie in the 1970s.

Census and Demographics Authority
The Census and Demographics Authority (CDA) is responsible for the collection, collation, and reconciliation of data from national censuses conducted by the Union's member-states. As each member of the Union conducts their census within the first two years of the decade, and the Census and Demographics Authority completes its work by the second numbered year of the decade (i.e. 2032). The Authority was created in 1960 following problems with initial apportionment within the Levantine Union Diet. The CDA uses machine learning and electronic methods to reconcile the different national censuses, particularly focusing on eliminating duplicate entries.

Levantine Union Intelligence Center
As part of the Union's apparatus a voluntary law enforcement information sharing center and network were created. The Levantine Union Intelligence Center (LUIC) serves as the collation center for all of the law enforcement intelligence involving criminal activity taking place in multiple member states. The center is primarily tasked with modelling and predicting criminal trends across the union. Member states typically also have national information centers, but in less developed nations, particularly the Deric States the LUIC also provides national level analysis as part of the shared cost. The LUIC also provides forensic laboratory services and hosts a forensic database that hosts criminal files and other forensic information that is available to all Union members regardless of their participation in the LUIC.

The Union also has a Catastrophic Operations Coordination System (LUCOCS), a disaster Mutual aid pact with a cadre of professionals that are required to be familiar with all of the nations emergency operating plans and are trained in the management of multi-national disasters, specifically in coordinating any Union aid and support. The cadre are employees of their member states emergency management arm and serve as liaison's during large-scale disaster. They meet annually to review past responses, to discuss concerns and trends, and to exercise together. Each member state assigns three to nine emergency managers to the cadre, preferably with specialists in response operations, logitics, and recovery operations. At the present Burgundie and Urcea are the only nations who can afford to assign and train nine specialists, but through cross train with proximate Deric States, they are hope to increase cadre size in the near future.

Economy
The economy of the Levantine Union is the integrated economies of its member states, which have been tied together not only by the Economic Development Agency of the Levantine Union and common market established by the Levantine Union Market and Currency Authority, but also by the historic ties of the member nations of the Union. As nearly all members of the Union were members of the Holy Levantine Empire, which also had a common market and shared tariffs to a certain extent, the member economies of the Union organically grew together and have been closely related for more than a millennia.

The Levantine Union economy is the largest in the world, comprising a substantial share of the world's. The Union, through its member states and especially Urcea and Burgundie, have a significant global trade presence, and the Union's economic influence over both Crona and Alshar is considerable.

The transportation networks of the Levantine Union are mostly integrated, with some exceptions, allowing for open and free transit of people and goods throughout most of the Levantine continent.