Ireland 1542

     In 2004 Ireland issued this stamp to mark the entrance of 10 new countries, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuanaia, Malta, Poland, the Slovak Republic, and Slovenia, into the European Union. The map shows the older members of the Union in blue and the new members in yellow.
     Cyprus appears to have been relocated and is shaped like the island of Crete. An Post (the Irish Post Office)  states, "What appears to be Crete is in  fact Cyprus. The map has been tweaked and Cyprus did not fit into the perspective, so we had to move it.... it [the design] is not intended to be a map of Europe.... We won't be selling them in Crete...."
    The stamp also has several national borders missing: the border between Cyprus and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus on the island,  the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland, the border between Norway and Sweden,  the one between the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic and the one between Hungary and Slovenia.