MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Kast and Paz open the way in La Paz to normalising Chile-Bolivia relations

“President Paz, today we stop turning our backs on each other. We did not come just for a gesture, we came to begin making history,” Kast said after the bilateral meetings

Chilean President José Antonio Kast and his Bolivian counterpart Rodrigo Paz pledged on Friday in La Paz to move towards normalising diplomatic relations “at the highest level”, broken off since 1978, during a visit the Chilean government described as historic as the first official bilateral visit by a Chilean president to Bolivia in more than seven decades. The two governments signed economic integration and border security agreements, although they did not announce the restoration of embassies.

“President Paz, today we stop turning our backs on each other. We did not come just for a gesture, we came to begin making history,” Kast said after the bilateral meetings. Paz replied that the two countries have “historical differences” and that the claim to sea access is enshrined in Bolivia’s Constitution, “but Bolivia understands that this history cannot hold back its development. Problems of the past must be resolved.” Kast invited Paz on a state visit to Chile in 2027.

Ministers from both countries signed agreements on mining integration, electricity interconnection, bi-oceanic corridors, border security and the migration status of Bolivians living in Chile. They also discussed reviving the Arica-La Paz railway, provided for in the 1904 treaty between Bolivia and Chile, 24-hour operation at the Tambo Quemado-Chungará border crossing and the fight against smuggling. According to the Oruro customs post, more than 76% of Bolivia’s foreign trade passes through the Chilean ports of Arica and Iquique.

Bolivia’s claim to sovereign access to the sea, which it lost at the International Court of Justice in 2018, was not on the agenda. “We are not going to renounce our historical claim, but it is also clear that we have to address a fundamental agenda,” said Bolivia’s Minister of the Presidency, Fernando Aramayo.

The rapprochement comes at a time of alignment between the two governments, which this year joined the Shield of the Americas, the US-backed regional security alliance. The Bolivian opposition, however, criticised the visit over the destruction in Chile of part of a seized shipment of Bolivian timber over alleged traces of drugs. “The situation is tense, we cannot be hypocrites,” said deputy Elena Pachacute of the Unidad alliance.