Atacama border dispute
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Image:Tarapaca.jpg The Atacama border dispute between Bolivia and Chile began in the 1800s over the Atacama corridor, a part of the Atacama Desert which now forms northern Chile. The Atacama Desert is bordered by the Coast Range on the west and the Andes on the east. The geography of the area was a very large factor in determining how the border dispute began. Because of the mountains, the area has rains only 2 to 4 times a century, making it one of the driest places on Earth.
National boundaries in the Atacama region had not been definitely determined. When nitrate, silver and copper deposits were discovered in the area, both Bolivia and Chile established competing claims for the territory. Other countries' interest was drawn due to the importance of nitrates in the production of fertilizer and high explosives; Britain, Spain and the USA had a strategic and economic stake in controlling the resource.
A treaty was made in 1874 allowed Chile to make exploit the area without explotation fees for a period of 25 years. Four years later, another Bolivian government rejected the treaty and attempted to raise taxes on a Chilean nitrate company. As an answer to this action, the Chilean army occupied Antofagasta, by that time a Bolivian city. Chile declared war to Bolivia in March 1879, and to Peru in May 1879, starting the War of the Pacific.
Six years later, at the end of the war, Chile had adquired the Atacama corridor (now Atacama Region) as well as the province of Antofagasta (Antofagasta Region) and the Peruvian Tarapacá (Tarapacá Region), turning Bolivia into a landlocked state.
Bolivia still holds claims on the Atacama corridor, which Chile rejects, yet offers instead unrestricted but not sovereign maritime access through the territory for the export of Bolivian natural gas and other commodities.