World court: scant disagreement in Chile, Bolivia water row

THE HAGUE (AP) — The International Court of Justice on Thursday found little to rule on in a long-running dispute over a small river which flows from Bolivia to Chile as the Latin American neighbors had mostly resolved their conflict during the proceedings.

The United Nations' highest court spent most of the hour-long hearing explaining that the two countries' legal claims over the Silala River - a short waterway in the Atacama Desert - were “without objection” as both countries have now agreed on how the water should be managed.

“It is an international watercourse, as both parties now agree,” said an American judge Joan E. Donoghue, who serves as the court's president. Bolivia had initially rejected this designation since international law requires international water resources to be managed cooperatively.

Chile brought the claim to the Hague-based court in 2016, arguing that Bolivia was violating international water laws by blocking the flow of the river. During hearings in April, Bolivia claimed the waterway isn’t a river at all, but rather a series of underground springs forced above ground by Chilean construction.

A 1997 U.N. convention on water rights requires countries whose borders intersect major waterways to share the natural resource equally.

In the past six years of legal proceedings in the case, the two countries significantly narrowed the scope of their disagreement through diplomatic efforts, eventually agreeing on all but several minor technical points.

Chile demanded that Bolivia notify it before carrying out certain activities on the waterway, but the court rejected this request as having no basis in international law.

Chile said Thursday's ruling was a victory.

“The court is now only restating the fact that Bolivia has accepted all that Chile came...