Instruct: Given a question, retrieve relevant passages that answer the question.
Query: Which country colonized the Beagle Channel? Chile or Argentina?
The region of the Beagle Channel, explored by Robert FitzRoy in the 1830s, was one of the last to be colonized by Chile and Argentina. The cold weather, the long distances from other inhabited regions, and the shortage of transport and subsistence, kept it far from the governmental task.
About the course of the Beagle Channel there were discrepancies. The eastern end of the Channel can be seen as a delta with an east-west arm and a north-south arm (around Navarino Island). The channel specified in the border treaty of 1881 was seen by Chile as the east-west arm, but by Argentina as the north-south arm. Following this controversy, two clauses were in dispute: Chile argued the Channel clause ("... to Chile shall belong all the islands to the south of Beagle Channel up to Cape Horn..."), while Argentina the Atlantic clause ("... the other islands there may be on the Atlantic to the east of Tierra del Fuego ..."). Some Chileans argued that the text ""until it touches the Beagle Channel"" in article III meant that Argentina had no navigable waters in the Beagle Channel, although this interpretation was not supported by the Chilean claim.
The treaty recognizes the Boundary Treaty of 1881 between Chile and Argentina and its "«…supplementary and declaratory instruments…»" as the unshakeable foundation of relations between Chile and Argentina and defines the border "«…from the end of the existing boundary in the Beagle Channel, i.e., the point fixed by the coordinates 55°07.3' South latitude and 66°25.0' West longitude…»" (Bold by Wikipedia). That is, Argentina recognizes the borderline determined by the Beagle Channel Arbitration in 1977 (Report and Decision of the Court of Arbitration), which it had earlier rejected. Hence, there is no mention of Picton, Nueva, Lennox and other islands. The Treaty calls its content a "Transaction"
The archipelago consists of a main island, Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, often called simply Tierra del Fuego or Isla Grande, with an area of , and a group of smaller islands. The main island is split between two countries: , and , 61.43% of the total area, belongs to Chile while 38.57% of the total area, belongs to Argentina. The archipelago is divided by an east–west channel, the Beagle Channel, immediately south of the main island. The largest islands south of the Beagle Channel are Hoste and Navarino.
The Boundary Treaty of 1881 was an attempted resolution of the territorial dispute between Argentina and Chile, and stipulated that the boundary between the two countries would run south from "Cape Espiritu Santo, on the northern shore of Tierre del Fuego till it touches the Beagle Channel". This division meant that Argentina would be entitled to the eastern portion while Chile would have the western part of the Tierre del Fuego. However, the Treaty did not clarify on the terminus of the Beagle channel, which created many territorial and collateral issues such as navigation rights. This resulted in a dispute between the two countries, particularly on the small islands (Picton, Lennox and Nueva) up to Cape horn. The dispute, which started in 1840, almost resulted in war between the two countries in 1978. However, with the intervention of the Vatican the issue was resolved. The Pope ruled on the dispute, a ratification ensued and a treaty was signed on 2 May 1985. Under this treaty, Chile retained control of all the disputed islands and Argentina was entitled to the navigational rights and maintained their limited presence on these islands.
In 1971 Chile and Argentina signed an agreement formally submitting the Beagle Channel issue to binding arbitration under auspices of the UK's Queen Elizabeth II. The court that was to decide the controversy was composed of five judges selected by Chile and Argentina from the International Court of Justice at The Hague. The court of arbitration's final decision would be submitted to the British Crown, which was then to recommend acceptance or rejection of the award of the court but not to modify it. On 2 May 1977 the court ruled that the islands and all adjacent formations belonged to Chile. See the Report and decision of the Court of Arbitration. In their only meeting in 1974 Juan Perón expressed his wishes to settle the conflict to Augusto Pinochet.
Trouble once again began to brew in the 1960s, when Argentina began to claim that the Picton, Lennox and Nueva islands in the Beagle Channel were rightfully theirs, although this was in direct contradiction of the 1881 treaty, as the Beagle Channel Arbitration, and the initial Beagle Channel cartography since 1881 stated.
Tensions between Argentina and Chile did not subside until the democratic government of Raúl Alfonsín took office in Argentina in December 1983. Still isolated diplomatically due to the War, the Alfonsín administration made great efforts to stabilise the border situation. Without the support of the opposition, Alfonsín called for non-binding referendum on 25 November 1984, which produced a result of 82.6% in favour of the second papal proposal. The voting was close only in the territory of Tierra del Fuego, which included the Argentine sector of the disputed Beagle Channel and many military personnel. Even there the vote was narrowly in favour of the treaty. On 29 November 1984 Argentina and Chile signed a protocol of agreement to a treaty at Vatican City giving the islands to Chile but maritime rights to Argentina.
Until 1887 there was no doubt in Argentina and Chile that the islands Picton, Nueva and Lennox belonged to Chile:
In 1904 the Argentine government solicited Chile to define jointly which was the deepest arm of the Beagle channel in the zone in order to find the demarcation of the border. On the basis of the international cartography of the zone, the descriptions of the discoverer of the channel, and the discourse of the signatories of the 1881 Treaty, Chile initially did not attach importance to the note.
Several small islands (Picton, Lennox and Nueva) up to the Cape Horn were the subject of the long-running Beagle conflict between Chile and Argentina; by the terms of a Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina they are now part of Chile. From the 1950s to 1970s several incidents involving the Chilean and Argentine Navy occurred in the waters of the Beagle Channel, for example the 1958 Snipe incident, the 1967 "Cruz del Sur" incident and the shelling of "Quidora" the same year. See List of incidents during the Beagle conflict.
Beagle Channel () is a strait in Tierra del Fuego Archipelago on the extreme southern tip of South America between Chile and Argentina. The channel separates the larger main island of Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego from various smaller islands including the islands of Picton, Lennox and Nueva; Navarino; Hoste; Londonderry; and Stewart. The channel's eastern area forms part of the border between Chile and Argentina and the western area is entirely within Chile.
The increasing significance of Beagle channel region led to various incidents and confrontations between Chile and Argentina around transit and fishing rights, which could potentially lead to full-scale war.
Although it is navigable by large ships, there are safer waters to the south (Drake Passage) and to the north (Strait of Magellan). Under the Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina, ships of other nations navigate with a Chilean pilot between the Strait of Magellan and Ushuaia through the Magdalena Channel and the Cockburn Channel to the Pacific Ocean, then by the Ballenero Channel, the O'Brien Channel and the northwest branch of the Beagle Channel.
The new name didn't prevail and disappeared into oblivion. The Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina mention (only) the Beagle channel.[5]
The Beagle Channel develops between several islands; to the north lies Argentine-Chilean Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, to the south Hoste, Navarino, and Picton and Nueva, which were claimed by Argentina until 1984. The latter two lie at the bi-national eastern entrance to the channel while the western entrance is wholly inside Chile. The western entrance of Beagle Channel is divided by Gordon Island into two channels. Some minor islands exist inside the channel among them Snipe Islet and Gable Island. Except for eastern Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego and Gable Island all islands mentioned here belong to Chile.
The Beagle Conflict was a border dispute between Argentina and Chile, in which Argentina claimed sovereignty of the Picton, Lennox and Nueva islands off the coast south of Tierra del Fuego, and took both countries to the brink of war in 1978. The conflicts dates back to the Boundary Treaty of July 23, 1881, which did not specify the border to details in this waters. The conflict was finally resolved on January 23, 1984, when Argentina and Chile signed the Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina giving the islands to Chile but most maritime rights to Argentina.
This partially reproduced map corresponds to that titled Preliminary Map of the Southern Region of the Argentine Republic which was included as No. XIV in the Argentine Evidence submitted by the Argentine Government to . It is the first official map of Argentina showing in the area of the Beagle Channel a different frontier from the one established in the Boundary Treaty with Chile of 1881. As may be seen from the map, the boundary line deviates from the Beagle Channel towards Picton and Richmond Passages to end up between Lennox and Nueva Islands. In that way Picton and Nueva Islands appear as Argentine and Lennox Island as Chilean. The islands and islets extending southward as far as Cape Horn continue to be shown as under Chilean sovereignty. It should be recalled that there was no question concerning the territories to the south of the Magellan Strait in the British Arbitration of 1898–1902. Thus neither Chile nor Argentina made any specific reference to the boundary shown on the Argentine map reproduced here.
Both countries disagreed about the sovereign rights over the zone and Snipe, an uninhabitable islet between Picton Island and Navarino Island, claimed by both. Chileans call the waterway around the islet "Beagle Channel", but in Argentina they called it "Moat channel" on the grounds that the Beagle Channel, allegedly, went south around Navarino Island. In accordance with the Beagle Channel Arbitration and the Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina, it should be called Beagle Channel.
The relationship between the two countries can be traced back to an alliance during Spanish colonial times. Both colonies were offshoots of the Viceroyalty of Peru, with the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata (which Argentina was a part of) being broken off in 1776, and Chile not being broken off until independence. Argentina and Chile were colonized by different processes. Chile was conquered as a southward extension of the original conquest of Peru, while Argentina was colonized from Peru, Chile and from the Atlantic.
The Papal mediation in the Beagle conflict followed the failure of negotiations between Chile and Argentina, when, on 22 December 1978, the Argentinian Junta started Operation Soberanía, to invade Cape Horn and islands awarded to Chile by the Beagle Channel Arbitration. Soon after the event, Pope John Paul II, offered to mediate and sent his personal envoy Cardinal Antonio Samoré to Buenos Aires. Argentina, in acceptance of the authority of the Pope over the overwhelmingly Catholic Argentine population, called off the military operation and accepted the mediation. On 9 January 1979 Chile and Argentina signed the Act of Montevideo formally requesting mediation by the Vatican and renouncing the use of force.
Beagle Channel Arbitration between the Republic of Argentina and the Republic of Chile, Escudé, Carlos and Cisneros, Andrés, , archived from the original , in Spanish Language. Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Chile: Relaciones Chileno–Argentinas, La controversia del Beagle. Genf, Switzerland, 1979, English and Spanish Language Text of the , Copy to the United Nations, English Language Mateo Martinic, Cartografía Magallánica 1523–1945, ISBN956-7189-07-2, Ediciones de la Universidad de Magallanes, 1999
The direct negotiations between Chile and Argentina about the islands and maritime rights in Beagle conflict began after the Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom announced on 2 May 1977 the judgement of the Beagle Channel Arbitration to the governments of both countries. The court ruled that the islands and all adjacent formations belonged to Chile. The direct negotiations finished with the Act of Montevideo on 9 January 1979, where both countries accept the papal mediation after Argentina's call off of the Operation Soberanía. This was the most dangerous phase of the Beagle Conflict and there was a real possibility of open warfare.
During the Beagle Channel Arbitration Argentina brought forward the argument that the Pactos de Mayo implied a demarcation clause between both countries: Chile at the Pacific and Argentina at the Atlantic. Chile denied the argument; the pactos are not a border treaty and therefore no place is named as limit between the Pacific and the Atlantic, the Cape Horn is limit between both oceans is an Argentine convention.
Chile was on the brink of being invaded by Argentina,(also ruled by a military government) as the Argentina Junta started the Operation Soberania on 22 December 1978 because of the strategic Picton, Lennox and Nueva islands at the southern tip of South America on the Beagle Canal. A full-scale war was prevented only by the call off of the operation by Argentina due to military and political reasons. But the relations remained tense as Argentina invaded the Falklands (Operation Rosario). Chile along with Colombia, were the only countries in South America to criticize the use of force by Argentina in its war with the U.K. over the Falkland Islands. Chile actually helped the United Kingdom during the war. The two countries (Chile and Argentina) finally agreed to papal mediation over the Beagle canal that finally ended in the Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina ("Tratado de Paz y Amistad"). Chilean sovereignty over the islands and Argentinian east of the surrounding sea is now undisputed.
In 1978 the bellicose Argentine dictatorship abrogated the binding Beagle Channel Arbitration and started the Operation Soberania in order to invade Chile but aborted it a few hours later due to military and political reasons. The conflict was resolved after the Argentine defeat in the Falklands by Papal mediation in the Beagle conflict of Pope John Paul II and in the form of a Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1984 between Chile and Argentina ("Tratado de Paz y Amistad"), granting the islands to Chile and most of the Exclusive economic zone to Argentina; since then, other border disputes with Chile have been resolved via diplomatic negotiations.