Ecuador, Peru Reportedly Reach Border Deal

Ecuador and Peru have resolved a decades-old dispute over a 48-mile strip of jungle, Brazil’s foreign minister said Friday.

Brazil, together with the United States, Argentina and Chile, brokered the agreement, which offers something to both feuding neighbors.

The four mediating nations stepped in when Peru and Ecuador deadlocked after three years of negotiations. The mediators required that Peru and Ecuador accept whatever solution they presented as a final decision.

Ecuadorean President Jamil Mahuad and Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori will sign the territorial agreement Monday at a ceremony in Brazil’s capital, Brasilia.

The border dispute dates to 1941, when Peru and Ecuador fought a war along the Pacific coast at a time when their frontier was not fully defined.

Under the agreement, announced by Brazilian Foreign Minister Luiz Felipe Lampreia, the disputed area will be demarcated along the Cordillera del Condor mountain range, as Peru argued it should.

But a jungle-cloaked hill lying within the territory allocated to Peru will be granted to Ecuador as private property, while still remaining part of Peru.

The 247-acre hill area, called Tiwintza, is a highly emotional symbol to Ecuador because its troops defended it successfully against assaults by Peruvian troops during their last border war in 1995.

The agreement also calls for contiguous national parks to be created in the disputed area.

Ecuador’s president, seeking to stress the positive, said Tiwintza “becomes Ecuadorean property forever.”

In Lima, the Peruvian capital, Fujimori countered criticism that he had given up too much by noting that the border will be drawn largely from what Peru wanted.