SAN ANDRES ISLAND, COLOMBIA — Colombia says Nicaragua gave up all claims to this idyllic Caribbean island in a 1928 treaty. Nicaragua contends that it signed the treaty at the point of a gun while occupied by U.S. Marines and that it is the rightful owner.
The territorial spat, now before the International Court of Justice at The Hague, is just one of several roiling Latin America these days.
In some ways, the region resembles a neighborhood with residents at one another's throats. The issues aren't loud music or barking dogs, but the environment and ownership of lucrative oil and fishing rights, land and waterways.
Chile, Bolivia and Peru continue to bicker over land and maritime rights that Chile has claimed since it won a three-way war in 1884.
Venezuela is at loggerheads with Guyana to the east and Colombia to the west over its borders, with rich oil and mineral deposits at stake.
Ecuador claims its territory is being violated by Colombia's anti-coca spraying.
Argentina says that pollution from a paper plant being built in Uruguay on the banks of the bordering Uruguay River will violate border accords.
Nicaragua and Costa Rica, meanwhile, argue over rights to their common river boundary, the San Juan.
There is no near-term prospect of territorial wars over these border disputes such as those fought by Peru and Ecuador in 1995 and El Salvador and Honduras in 1969, and the fighting between Argentina and Britain in 1982 over the Falkland Islands.
But tensions are rising.
The Colombia-Nicaragua standoff over San Andres, two other Caribbean islands and thousands of square miles of ocean floor, all under Colombian control for two centuries, is especially complex. It pits opposing principles in boundary disputes: what has been agreed to in the past versus what modern conventions deem a fair division of territory.
"Modern law of the sea, which is still evolving, is confronting the classic stance of international law with its strict respect for treaties," said Antonio Rengifo Lozano, a law professor at National University of Colombia in Bogota. "The way this and other conflicts will be solved is crucially important because they will set lasting precedents for the 21st century."
In 1803, Spain assigned the islands to the jurisdiction of its Nuevo Granada colony, which included modern-day Colombia. The 1928 treaty solidified that claim, while giving Nicaragua rights to the so-called Mosquito Coast on Nicaragua's Caribbean shoreline.
