June 2026 update

On June 12, 2026, Serbia and Slovenia issued a similar souvenir sheet containing one single stamp entitled “Humanitarians, Queen Marija Karađorđević and her court lady Franja Tavčar”. The Serbia souvenir sheet, 100×67 mm, was issued at 10,000 samples while the Slovenian souvenir sheet was printed at 18,000 samples. (Information was provided by Janko Stampfl, Slovenia).

Russia and the Philippines celebrated their 50th anniversary of diplomatic relationship on June 2, 2026 with an issue on June 18, 2026 of stamps representing fauna: the Russian Greater jerboa (Allactaga major) and the Philippine mouse deer (Tragulus nigricans). To date, no information from the Philippines postal administration is available, but Enzo Cafaro (Italy) was able to provide a copy of the Philippines miniature sheet, confirming that it could translate in either a twin or a concerted issue. Any additional information is welcome.

Moldova and Romania celebrated the centenary of the first flight of the Bucharest – Galați – Chișinău airmail service, illustrated by a Haviland DH-9 plane. This is a nice twin issue released on June 24, 2026. Romania released two stamps, showing either a plane over a landscape with a bridge (design A), or a flying plane, next to the names of the three towns from the airmail line, as well as a cancelled cover (design B). These two stamps were issued in panes of 32 stamps, or in miniature sheets of 3 stamps and a label. Additionally, a souvenir sheet with a single stamp showing the design A, with flag, cancelled cover as well as a black and white photograph became also available. Moldova released the same two stamps A and B in miniature sheets of 8 stamps (with two additional labels) and a souvenir sheet containing the design B, together with a map.

Note that 2×3,200 Romanian stamps (A and B) were printed in panes of 32 stamps, i.e., in 2 sheets showing 4 lines of 8 stamps. The third line was intentionally printed upside down, making possible to create 8 pairs tête-bêche out of each each pane. These printed stamps represent only 100 panes of 32, from which a maximum of 2×8 tête-bêche pairs could have been isolated, resulting in a maximum of 2×800 tête-bêche pairs possible. The real number of tête-bêche pairs will definitely remain far below that figure.

On June 10, 2026, Türkiye issued a souvenir sheet showing the portraits of Yunus Emre (1240-1320), Turkish folk poet, and Hakani-I Sirvani (1126-1199), actually Afzal al-Dīn Badīl ibn ʿAlī ibn ʿOthmān, commonly known as Khāqānī, Persian poet, entitled ‘joint issue with Azerbaijan‘. Unfortunately, by the time of publishing this page, no information has been made available from this country.

The situation is similar with a joint issue involving Morocco and Mauritania, which illustration was provided by Eric Contesse (France). On the Moroccan stamps, it is clearly stated that it is a joint issue. These stamps are also supposed to be released during the month of June and information from Mauritania is missing so far.

Another Türkiye Romania joint issue was announced in the Türkish philatelic program, expected to be released on June 30, 2026, but no counterpart is mentionned in the Romanian philatelic program. On the other hand, Romania still describes a joint issue with Kazakhstan scheduled for June 2026 (Biosphere reserves), but there are no news that came up recently from both countries about this issue.

The first year of office of the Pope Leo XIV announced originally by the Vatican State as a joint issue with Italy, was eventually reduced to an anniversary issue from Vatican alone, on May 8, 2026, and this entry had to be removed from the poten,tial 2026 issues.

All the above news were introduced in the catalogue which is now available in an updated form in the appropriate section.

March 2026 News

New countries are slowly making surface regarding some 2024 and 2025 omnibus series:

Stamps from Mauritania relative to the UPU 150th anniversary (apparently 4 stamps, only one seen so far – T20241009), and the 80th anniversary of the Arab League (4 stamps – T20250322) became available. Dates of issue are unknown. Only bad quality images are available so far. Note that the currency used on these Mauritanian stamps is wrongly expressed in “RMU” instead of the correct “MRU”, making these issues questionable. Additional information is welcome. At the same time Saudi Arabia issued also two stamps, one related to this same Arab League 80th anniversary (T20250322), but issued one year later, on March 22, 2026, and the other related to the Arab Postal Day (T20250803) and issued on March 14, 2026. Thanks to Kenneth Sequeira, Dubai and Ali Ahmed Med Achour, Algeria, for this information. Source of the Mauritania stamps’ illustrations is Busch Collectibles.

During the year 2025, we also forgot to mention the joint issue between the three United Nations offices of Geneva, New York and Vienna related to the 80th anniversary of the United Nations. As usual, when only these three offices are involved, we cannot consider those stamps as joint, but the catalogue mentions (in italics and gray color) all issues of these offices when design and illustrations are identical. So, we will complete the catalogue with this information (provided by Jaap Sarelse, the Netherlands), but file it under N20251024. Issue date was October 24, 2025 and mixed first day covers were also made available.

From Adam Paish (UK): To celebrate the centenary of the birth of the late Queen Elizabeth II, similar commemorative mini-sheets will be issued, each containing four different stamps, by the postal administrations of Ascension IslandFalkland IslandsSouth Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands and Tristan da Cunha. The stamps depict photographic images by the British society photographer Marcus Adams (1875-1959) and are scheduled for release on April 21, 2026. The Bahamas postal administration also plans to release a set of four stamps in the same photographic style on April 16, 2026, but these may not be in an identical sheet format. This is not a true joint stamp issue, but definitely worthy of mention and will be described without details (omnibus series [PO]) in the catalogue. 

New Zealand, Gibraltar and the United Kingdom have also released or will be releasing stamps to mark the anniversary, and no doubt other countries will follow.  

Among the true joint issues, two were confirmed, but are involving Uruguay, another country from where it is difficult to obtain information. On March 26, 2026, Uruguay issued stamps jointly with Mexico (125 years diplomatic relations) and on March 30, 2026 with Indonesia (handicrafts) (Information provided by Kenneth Sequeira, Dubai and Enzo Cafaro, Italy). The Indonesia stamp designs have been available for a couple of months and the picture of the Uruguayan stamps related to Mexico became available recently, but all other information in particular from Mexico, is still missing. The catalogue pages will be updated as soon as information is more complete (it may take another two weeks).