06:53 | Lima, Jan. 31 (ANDINA).
Peru and Chile have agreed to “gradually” implement a ruling from an international court that ended a long-simmering dispute over their maritime border, a high-ranking Peruvian official said Thursday.
A broad agreement on implementing the ruling was made during a meeting between Peruvian President Ollanta Humala and Chilean President Sebastian Piñera on Wednesday, Peru’s foreign relations minister, Eda Rivas, said during a news conference.
The presidents agreed that the implementation of the ruling should be done “in good faith between both countries and gradually,” Rivas said.
According to a report by Dow Jones Newswires, Rivas declined to say how long the countries could take to implement the new border.
President Piñera confirmed in a statement after the meeting that his government would meet with Peruvian officials to coordinate the implementation of the court’s ruling. “When this ruling is implemented and fully complied with, we’ll be able to leave behind past agendas, which have often divided us, and concentrate all our efforts on the future,” Piñera said.
The Peruvian and Chilean presidents met in Havana on the sidelines of the Summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, or Celac. The meeting, which also included incoming Chilean President Michelle Bachelet, came two days after the International Court of Justice awarded Peru a chunk of the Pacific Ocean once controlled by Chile.
The Hague-based international court handed over to Peru almost 50,000 square kilometers of ocean. Chile maintained control over about 16,000 square kilometers of the area that was under dispute, which is rich in anchovies used in the fish-meal industry. Peru and Chile are the world’s top two exporters of fish meal, which is used as a fertilizer and in animal feed.
Peruvian officials have celebrated the court’s ruling, while Chilean officials have said they disagree with it but would comply with the judgment. The decision can’t be appealed. Peru’s government has said it has started to implement the decision. The government this week sent ships from the navy to part of the Pacific territory.
While the court established the general outline of the new border, it said that Peru and Chile are responsible for establishing its exact coordinates.
“We are coordinating with our counterparts in Chile to establish a timeline for complying and implementing the ruling,” Ms. Rivas said. “We will start with the coordinates.”
Settling the border dispute is expected to help ease lingering hard feelings from a 19th-century war in which Chile defeated Peru and took a large portion of its territory.
(END) INT/EEP
Published: 1/31/2014