Colombia welcomes ICJ ruling dismissing Nicaragua’s push to increase territory past 200 nautical miles from shoreline.
The United Nations’ prime courtroom has dismissed Nicaragua’s claims towards Colombia in a decades-long authorized battle over an oil and fish-rich swathe of the Caribbean Sea.
The Worldwide Courtroom of Justice (ICJ) stated on Thursday that it “rejects” Nicaragua’s arguments towards an earlier 2012 ruling that gave it a big chunk of the Caribbean whereas awarding seven small islands to Colombia.
Nicaragua went again to the Hague-based courtroom in 2013 to argue that its territory ought to lengthen past the 200 nautical miles (370km or 230 miles) from its shoreline that’s customary underneath worldwide regulation.
It claimed its territory ought to as an alternative comply with the continental shelf that extends underneath the ocean from its shoreline. However Colombia disputed that, saying it overlaps with the world by which the archipelago of islands is situated.
“No matter any scientific and technical issues, Nicaragua shouldn’t be entitled to an prolonged continental shelf inside 200 nautical miles from the baselines of Colombia’s mainland coast,” ICJ President Choose Joan Donoghue stated on Thursday morning, studying the choice.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro welcomed the courtroom’s ruling as a “nice victory” for his nation.
“With this ruling we hope to shut the border dispute and concentrate on bringing sustainable growth to our archipelago,” he wrote on Twitter.
Gran victoria para Colombia en La Haya. La CIJ no accedió a las pretensiones de Nicaragua sobre expandir su plataforma continental. Esperamos con este fallo cerrar la controversia limítrofe y abocarnos a llevar desarrollo sostenible a nuestro archipiélago.
— Gustavo Petro (@petrogustavo) July 13, 2023
Relations between Colombia and Nicaragua, international locations that don’t share a land border, have been strained for many years over disputed maritime limits.
In a associated case, the ICJ dominated final yr that Colombia should “instantly stop” patrolling and making an attempt to manage fishing actions and maritime analysis in elements of the western Caribbean off the Nicaraguan coast.
The judges stated in April 2022 that the waters in query had been inside Nicaragua’s unique financial zone (EEZ).
Judgements of the ICJ, which was arrange after World Conflict II to rule in disputes between UN member states, are closing and can’t be appealed.
Various Latin American states, together with Chile and Bolivia, Guyana and Venezuela, and Guatemala and Belize, have requested the UN courtroom lately to resolve decades- or in some instances centuries-old territorial claims.
