724.3415/343
Reply of the Bolivian Government to the Note Sent by the Special Committee of the International Conference of American States on Conciliation and Arbitration
- First: Bolivia agrees to sign a Protocol formally accepting the good offices of the Conference.
- Second: The bases of said Protocol would be as follows:
- a)
- The Commission on Investigation shall verify that it is true that within a status of pacific relations existing between Bolivia and Paraguay and in spite of the Convention signed at Buenos Aires on June [July] 12, 1928,5 whereby both countries bound themselves to decide their territorial differences through pacific means, Paraguay, violating said obligations, without a prior declaration of hostility and in an uncalled for and violent manner, ordered the attacking and [Page 821] destruction of the Bolivian outpost Vanguardia, by regular forces of the Paraguayan army on the fifth of this month.
- b)
- It shall be expressly set forth that the basic questions relative to territorial litigation pending between the two countries shall not be the subject of conciliatory proceedings or inquiry, since there are obligations to submit this matter to strictly legal arbitration.
- Third: Bolivia would appoint two or three delegates to the Commission of Investigation and Conciliation.
- Fourth: The Conference shall appoint representatives of five neutral States to complete the Commission, they to be acceptable to both Parties.
- Fifth: The Commission shall establish the facts and fix the moral and material responsibilities of the aggressor, in accordance with the provisions of international law.
- Sixth: Bolivia will agree to cease all concentration of troops along the line of forts near the Paraguayan forts and all hostilities until the Commission of Investigation and Conciliation gives its decision.
- Seventh: The Commission shall meet in Washington.
- Eighth: Bolivia does not consider the renewal of diplomatic relations to be opportune.
Bolivia expressly states that, in conformity with the uti possidetis juris of 1810, her territorial dominion extends to the confluence of the Paraguay and Pilcomayo Rivers, sustains in all its integrity, her right over El Chaco and declares herself ready to submit the litigation to the decision of juridical arbitration. The arbitrator shall be the International Court of Justice of The Hague, but it is indispensable that, in conformity with existing Protocols, the territorial zone subject to arbitration shall be fixed.
- See Act of Suspension, Conference of Buenos Aires, in Proceedings of the Commission of Inquiry and Conciliation, Bolivia and Paraguay, p. 403.↩