Overcrowding has been a problem. In 1988 it was announced that 4,700 residents of the main island group would be resettled onto less-populated islands. Teburoro Tito was elected president in 1994. Kiribati's 1995 act of moving the international date line far to the east to encompass Kiribati's Line Islands group, so that it would no longer be divided by the date line, courted controversy. The move, which fulfilled one of President Tito's campaign promises, was intended to allow businesses all across the expansive nation to keep the same business week. This also enabled Kiribati to become the first country to see the dawn of the third millennium, an event of significance for tourism. Tito was reelected in 1998. Kiribati gained UN membership in 1999. ^{11 -}

In 2002 Kiribati passed a controversial law enabling the government to shut down newspapers. The legislation followed the launching of Kiribati's first successful nongovernment-run newspaper. President Tito was reelected in 2003, but was removed from office in March 2003 by a no-confidence vote and replaced by a Council of State. Anote Tong of the opposition party Boutokaan Te Koaua was elected to succeed Tito in July 2003. He was re-elected in 2007. ^{12 -}

In the summer of 2008, Kiribati officials asked Australia and New Zealand to accept Kiribati citizens as permanent refugees. Kiribati is expected to be the first country in which all land territory disappears due to global climate change. In June 2008, the Kiribati president Anote Tong said that the country has reached "the point of no return";he added:"To plan for the day when you no longer have a country is indeed painful but I think we have to do that." ^{13 - 14 - 15 - 16 -}

In government terms, Kiribati has a police force, which carries out law enforcement functions and paramilitary duties, and which has small police posts on all islands, but no military. The police have one patrol boat. ^{18 - Security assistance would be provided if necessary by Australia and New Zealand.}

In November 1999 it was announced that Japan's National Space Development Agency planned to lease land on Kiritimati (Christmas Island) for 20 years, on which to build a spaceport. ^] The agreement stipulated that Japan was to pay US$840,000 per year and would also pay for any damage to roads and the environment. A Japanese-built downrange tracking station operates on Kiritimati ^{21 - and an abandoned airfield on the island was designated as the landing strip for a proposed reusable unmanned space shuttle called HOPE-X. HOPE-X, however, was eventually canceled by Japan in 2003.}

According to the South Pacific Regional Environment Program, two small uninhabited Kiribati islets, Tebua Tarawa and Abanuea, disappeared underwater in 1999. ^{24 - The islet of Tepuka Savilivili (Tuvalu;not a Gilbertese name) no longer has any coconut trees due to salination. 25 - The United NationsIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts that sea levels will rise by about half a metre (20 in) by 2100 due to global warming and a further rise would be inevitable. It is thus likely that within a century the nation's arable land will become subject to increased soil salination and will be largely submerged. 26 - However, sea-level rise may not necessarily mean Kiribati will be inundated. Paul Kench at the University of Auckland in New Zealand and Arthur Webb at the South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission in Fiji released a study in 2010 on the dynamic response of reef islands to sea level rise in the central Pacific. Kiribati was mentioned in the study, and Webb and Kench found that the three major urbanised islands in Kiribati - Betio, Bairiki and Nanikai - increased by 30 per cent (36 hectares), 16.3 per cent (5.8 hectares) and 12.5 per cent (0.8 hectares), respectively. 27 -}

Kiribati is the only country in the world to be located in both hemispheres and lying on both sides of the 180th meridian.

Neither the Phoenix nor Line Islands are served by the domestic carriers. Fiji's national carrier Air Pacific provides an international service from Fiji's main airport, Nadi International Airport. Our Airline, the national airline of Nauru, formerly provided service to Nauru International Airport, connecting to Honiara, the capital of the Solomon Islands, and further to Brisbane, Australia, but this service was cancelled in June 2008. ^{35 -}