What distinguishes a coastal State with maritime rights from a landlocked State which has none, is certainly not the landmass, which both possess, but the existence of a maritime front in one State and its absence in the other. The juridical link between the State’s territorial sovereignty and its rights to certain adjacent maritime expanses is established by means of its coast.

Continental Shelf (Libyan Arab Jamahiriya/Malta), 1985 ICJ 13, 41