THE HAGUE, Netherlands — The United Nations’ high court docket on Thursday rejected a case introduced by Nicaragua in a decades-long dispute with Colombia over maritime borders and entitlements within the Caribbean.
The Worldwide Courtroom of Justice dismissed Nicaragua’s bid to achieve financial rights over an space of the Caribbean Sea that lies greater than 200 nautical miles (230 statute miles, 370 kilometers) from its shores.
Nicaragua needed the worldwide court docket to evaluation the boundaries of its continental shelf, and decide new maritime boundaries for the Central American nation.
Colombia already claims unique financial rights in a lot of the world that lies to the east of Nicaragua’s 200 nautical mile boundary. Bogota argued that there isn’t a precedent for extending a rustic’s 200-nautical-mile zone, when it clashes with that of one other nation.
Members of Colombia’s authorized staff hugged in court docket after the ruing, and Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos tweeted that it was “a triumph” for his nation.
The world has lengthy been claimed by each international locations, and Nicaragua gained fishing rights over an enormous portion in a 2012 ruling by the world court docket in The Hague. However Colombia’s navy has continued to patrol the waters, that are additionally utilized by drug traffickers.
Colombia’s maritime claims are linked to its sovereignty over the San Andres and Providencia Archipelago, which lies about 700 kilometers (435 miles) north of Colombia’s Caribbean coast however solely 110 kilometers (68 miles) from Nicaragua’s coast.
The world court docket’s president, Joan E. Donoghue, mentioned {that a} nation’s proper to say a continental shelf past the 200-nautical-mile restrict can’t “lengthen inside 200 nautical miles from the baselines of one other state.” The baselines are factors on land from which the continental shelf is measured.
“Nicaragua will not be entitled to an prolonged continental shelf inside 200 nautical miles from the baselines of San Andres and Providencia,” Donoghue mentioned.
The choice means the world court docket did not need to evaluation maritime boundaries between Colombia and Nicaragua, established by the court docket in a 2012 ruling, which have been below dispute for the previous twenty years.
The chief of Nicaragua’s delegation, Carlos José Argüello Gómez, mentioned that his nation would research the judgment “as a result of it has penalties in a really massive and complex space.” However he added that “in precept, clearly, regardless of the court docket mentioned, Nicaragua will adjust to it.”
Beneath worldwide regulation, coastal states have sovereignty over waters extending 12 nautical miles past their coastlines. They’ve unique financial and environmental rights over the seabed and waters that reach as much as 200 nautical miles past their coast.
Nonetheless, some international locations have tried to acquire jurisdiction over underwater options that lie past that restrict, by proving that these options are related to their continental cabinets — that’s the shallow seabed that extends past the coast.
A 1928 treaty between Colombia and Nicaragua acknowledged Colombia’s sovereignty over the islands of San Andres and Providencia, and gave Colombia financial rights over many of the waters round San Andres.
9 a long time later, Nicaragua filed a lawsuit towards this treaty, saying it violated worldwide regulation and disadvantaged the nation of its proper to 200 nautical miles of territorial waters.
In a 2012 ruling, the Worldwide Courtroom of Justice sided principally with Nicaragua and redrew the maritime borders between each international locations. The brand new borders prolonged Nicaragua’s unique financial zone, and stripped Colombia of about 80,000 sq. kilometers (30,000 sq. miles) of territorial waters.
Colombia did not acknowledge the ruling, and withdrew from the court docket’s jurisdiction a yr later, in 2013.
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Manuel Rueda contributed to this report from Bogota, Colombia.