CHACO DISPUTE SETTLED

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 253, 22 July 1938, Page 11

CHACO DISPUTE SETTLED

Century Of Bloodshed

Ends

AMERICAN NATIONS’ MEDIATION Six Presidents To Set Up Irrevocable Boundary By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright. (Received July 21, 8.45 p.m.) BUENOS AIRES, July 20. After a century of bloodshed, costing more than 100,000 lives, the Gran Chaco dispute between Paraguay and Bolivia, was finally adjudicated to-day by the mediation of six American nations.

The treaty, the terms of which were settled to-night, will provide for ratification by popular referendum, after which the Presidents of six nations, including the United States, will set up an irrevocable boundary in the Chaco.

The dispute between Paraguay and Bolivia over possession of a large part of the Gran Chaco, a more or less fever-ridden jungle area of believed petroleum potentialities, has blazed up intermittently for the last hundred years. To the two Governments belongs the distinction, if such it be, of being the first to violate the Kellogg-Briand peace pact designed to do away with war as an instrument of national policy. To bring about peace between the two countries has taxed the statesmanship of a number of the South American Republic diplomats for a number of years. A truce was declared in 1935, since when there has been very little fighting. The League of Nations previously made unsuccessful attempts at mediation, as did the United States Government.

During the several years of warfare both countries were practically bled white, losing well over 100,000 meiT, and it is anticipated it will take decades for them recover.

Bolivia, which has a better title to the area than Paraguay, whose claim to it precipitated the war, is afraid that if Paraguay secures the Gran Chaco she will lose her access to the Atlantic through the Paraguay and Pilcomayo rivers, which bound the disputed area.