MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Chile-Peru Relations Again Tense

A growing dispute between Peru and Chile over maritime rights has raised the hackles of diplomats in both nations and stoked tensions simmering since a sea war more than a century ago.

Peru and Chile are arguing over how much of the Pacific Ocean each should control on either side of their shared border, with Peru saying it has a right to more of the rich fishing waters that both countries depend on.

The issue emerged in recent days as Peru's Congress reviewed a bill seeking to redraw sea borders Chile says were set by agreements in 1952 and 1954, but the rivalry has smoldered since a sea war that Chile won against Peru and Bolivia in 1879.

"As far as we are concerned the (maritime) border limits with Peru were resolved in the treaties of 1952 and 1954," Chile's Interior Minister Francisco Vidal said yesterday.

Chile sees the maritime boundary as a horizontal line that starts close to the border of the two countries and cuts due west across the ocean, parallel to the Tropic of Cancer. Peru's proposed border is a south-westerly sloping line that follows the diagonal border into the Pacific.

The maritime tiff is the latest and most serious in a series of diplomatic irritants between the two countries, including Peru's attempts to try one of Chile's wealthiest businessmen.

"There's a permanent hypersensitivity and distrust between both countries and that won't go away until issues such as the maritime boundary are resolved," said Enrique Castillo, a political commentator for Peru's CPN radio. "From Peru's point of view, it just seems that Chile doesn't want to talk about it."

Chile fought the War of the Pacific against Peru and Bolivia from 1879 to 1883, winning Antofagasta, Bolivia's only outlet to the sea, and extensive areas from Peru.

"In my opinion this will end up inevitably at The Hague," said Ricardo Israel, a political analyst in Chile who warned the dispute will create diplomatic friction until it is settled. He said one worry is that both sides could start arresting fishermen who cross into each other's waters. "If those waters are in dispute, obviously they won't be able to allow this and will have to arrest them (fishermen) and process them, generating a mass of diplomatic friction," he said.

Israel and other local analysts predicted Chilean President Ricardo Lagos would take advantage of the Summit of the Americas meeting in Mar del Plata next week to meet with Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo to ease tensions.