''Perú v. Chile'' (also called the Chilean–Peruvian maritime dispute) was a public

international law International law, also known as public international law and the law of nations, is the set of Rule of law, rules, norms, Customary law, legal customs and standards that State (polity), states and other actors feel an obligation to, and generall ...

case concerning a

territorial dispute A territorial dispute or boundary dispute is a disagreement over the possession (law), possession or control of territories (land, maritime territory, water or airspace) between two or more political entities. Context and definitions Territorial ...

between the

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

n republics of

Peru Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...

and

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...

over the sovereignty of an area at

sea A sea is a large body of salt water. There are particular seas and the sea. The sea commonly refers to the ocean, the interconnected body of seawaters that spans most of Earth. Particular seas are either marginal seas, second-order section ...

in the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...

approximately in size. Peru contended that its maritime boundary delimitation with Chile was not fixed, but Chile claimed that it holds no outstanding border issues with Peru. On January 16, 2008, Peru brought forth the case to the

International Court of Justice The International Court of Justice (ICJ; , CIJ), or colloquially the World Court, is the only international court that Adjudication, adjudicates general disputes between nations, and gives advisory opinions on International law, internation ...

The Hague The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...

, the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

, which accepted the case and formally filed it as the ''Case concerning maritime delimitation between the Republic of Peru and the Republic of Chile - Perú v. Chile''. The dispute primarily concerned an area at sea between the parallel that crosses the end point of the land border between Chile and Peru, and the bisecting line perpendicular to the coasts of Chile and Peru. This line was formed by the overlapping of the baselines of both countries, forming a trapezoid of . Peru requested an equitable division of the maritime territory, but Chile demanded sovereignty over approximately of the territory. On a secondary level, the dispute included the status of a maritime triangle to the left of the aforementioned trapezoid, approximately in size, which Chile considered a part of the

international waters The terms international waters or transboundary waters apply where any of the following types of bodies of water (or their drainage basins) transcend international boundaries: oceans, large marine ecosystems, enclosed or semi-enclosed region ...

and Peru as a part of its maritime domain.

Facts

The background of this dispute goes back to the mid-1980s. In 1985, the then Foreign Minister of Peru, Allan Wagner first addressed this issue formally with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Chile at the time,

Jaime del Valle Jaime is a common Spanish and Portuguese male given name for Jacob (name), James (name), Jamie, or Jacques. In Occitania Jacobus became ''Jacome'' and later ''Jacme''. In east Spain, ''Jacme'' became ''Jaime'', in Aragon it became ''Chaime'', and ...

. The following year, the Peruvian Ambassador Juan Miguel Bakula Patino had an interview with Foreign Minister Jaime del Valle on this matter, and handled a diplomatic note, dated 23 May 1986. By the aforementioned note, issued by the Embassy of Peru in Santiago de Chile, Peru stated its position regarding the necessity of "concluding a treaty on

maritime boundaries A maritime boundary is a conceptual division of Earth's water surface areas using physical geography, physiographical or human geography, geopolitical criteria. As such, it usually bounds areas of exclusive sovereignty, national rights over mine ...

", on the premise that it must reach a formal and definitive delimitation of maritime spaces, which complement the geographical proximity between Peru and Chile. In ICJ proceedings Chile disputes that these meeting was ever about Peru wanting a maritime boundary treaty, in the contrary Chile argued that Peru recognized the Treaties signed in the 1950s and that meetings had a totally different basis. Chile ratified the Convention on the Law of the Sea in 1997 and, according to its text, in September 2000, deposited it with the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...

. Its nautical charts indicated the parallel 18º21'00" South as the maritime boundary between the two countries. The constitution of Peru prevents its government to ratify the sea convention however its Peruvian Government formalized its position on the issue, through a note sent to the United Nations on January 7, 2001, which does not recognize the line of latitude as the maritime boundary between the two countries. Public discussion on this subject was revived in 2005, when the Congress of Peru began to process a bill on determining the baseline of maritime domain, which are sequences of points that determine where it finishes the coastal edge and therefore begins the territorial sea as such, setting the width of the maritime domain of Peru to the distance of 200 nautical miles, using a line bisector in the south, bordering with Chile. The Peruvian law was passed and promulgated on November 3, 2005. On January 16, 2008, the government of Peru introduced in the

the ''"Case Concerning Maritime Delimitation between the Republic of Peru and the Republic of Chile"'', also called ''Peru v. Chile''. The case is meant to adjudicate the re-delimitation of the maritime border between these two countries. In the case, Peru, whose legal team included jurist Juan Vicente Ugarte del Pino, argued that the

maritime boundary A maritime boundary is a conceptual division of Earth's water surface areas using physiographical or geopolitical criteria. As such, it usually bounds areas of exclusive national rights over mineral and biological resources,VLIZ Maritime Boun ...

has never been defined by a treaty and should run on a southwestern direction from their land border, perpendicular to the natural slope of the South American coast in an equidistant angle from both coastlines. Chile claims that in trilateral treaties signed together with Peru and Ecuador in 1952 and 1954, it is clearly stated that a maritime boundary (written as "límite marítimo" in Spanish) runs in a western direction, parallel to the equator. The Chilean agent to the Court is former Undersecretary for Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Alberto van Klaveren. The Peruvian agent is the current Ambassador to The Netherlands, Allan Wagner.

Judgment

On January 27, 2014, in the final ruling of the Court, Peru gained some maritime territory. The maritime boundary extends only to 80 nautical miles off of the coast. From that point, the new border runs in a southwest direction to a point that is 200 miles equidistant from the coast of the two countries. Under the ruling, Chile lost control over part of its formerly claimed maritime territory and gives additional maritime territory to Peru. From the 27 January 2014 court press release

The Court concludes that the maritime boundary between the Parties starts at the intersection of the parallel of latitude passing through Boundary Marker No. 1 with the low-water line, and extends for 80 nautical miles along that parallel of latitude to Point A. From this point, the maritime boundary runs along the equidistance line to Point B, and then along the 200-nautical-mile limit measured from the Chilean baselines to Point C. In view of the circumstances of the case, the Court has defined the course of the maritime boundary between the Parties without determining the precise geographical co-ordinates.*

Significance

Physicist F. J. Duarte, Frank Duarte has been a consistent and early critic of the Chilean Government's handling of this dispute. In particular, he has sharply criticized President

Sebastián Piñera Miguel Juan Sebastián Piñera Echenique (; 1 December 1949 – 6 February 2024) was a Chilean businessman and politician who served as President of Chile from 2010 to 2014 and again from 2018 to 2022. The son of a Christian Democratic Party (C ...

's performance (deemed as favoring commercial interests over the interest of the Chilean people) and called for Chile's withdrawal from The Hague, early in 2012. Following the ruling, several political figures in Chile, of various political parties, have also called for Chile's withdrawal from The Hague that would, in addition, imply a withdrawal from the Pact of Bogota. Senators and members of parliament advocating this position include Ivan Moreira,La Segunda, January 27, 2014 http://www.lasegunda.com/Noticias/Politica/2014/01/910056/fuertes-criticas-de-parlamentarios-aqui-chile-no-ha-ganado-nada-hemos-perdido Jorge Tarud, Jaime Orpis,La Estrella de Arica, January 27, 2014 http://www.estrellaarica.cl/impresa/2014/01/27/full/4/ and Fulvio Rossi. Former president

Ricardo Lagos Ricardo Froilán Lagos Escobar (; born 2 March 1938) is a Chilean lawyer, economist and social-democratic politician who served as president of Chile from 2000 to 2006. During the 1980s he was a well-known opponent of the Chilean military di ...

has added his voice to the criticism of the tribunal's ruling. Furthermore, the newly designated minister for foreign relations, Heraldo Muñoz, has declared that the topic of membership in the Pact of Bogota should be under "legitimate discussion". On February 11, 2014, President

, originally a strong advocate of The Hague, requested a report on the advantages and disadvantages of Chile's membership in the Pact of Bogota.La Segunda, February 11, 2014 http://www.lasegunda.com/Noticias/Politica/2014/02/913578/presidente-pidio-informe-de-pros-y-contras-ante-retiro-de-pacto-de-bogota

References

External links

Peru v. Chile Maritime Dispute
o
the docket
of

an
Peru Takes Chile to UN World Court of 16 January 2008
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BBC
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Peru ICJ Team
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GAR Listing Both ICJ Teams of 16 January 2008
* All court documents: https://web.archive.org/web/20140130064247/http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/index.php?p1=3&p2=2&case=137 *
Press release
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chilean-Peruvian maritime dispute Territorial disputes of Chile Territorial disputes of Peru 2008 in Chile 2007 in Chile Chile–Peru relations Chile–Peru border International Court of Justice cases Disputed waters Controversies in Chile Controversies in Peru Territorial evolution of Peru

Facts

Judgment

Significance

See also

References

External links