Peruvian President Alan Garcia and his delegation pulled out of the APEC summit in Singapore early yesterday in protest over charges that Chile had paid a Peruvian military officer as a spy.
The espionage case has stoked diplomatic tensions in a long-running feud between Peru and Chile over their maritime border, but the two South American nations still share more than US$3 billion a year in bilateral trade.
The “president has left Singapore on his way back to Lima,” a Peruvian government official said.
Peru on Saturday recalled its envoy from Chile and said Garcia would leave the APEC summit early after Peruvian authorities said they had detained a Peruvian air force officer on charges he had spied for Chile.
Garcia and Chilean President Michelle Bachelet were scheduled to meet over the weekend as part of the APEC summit.
Chile’s government on Saturday rejected the spying accusations, and criticized Peru for over-reacting before any investigation had been concluded.
“When there are accusations of this type, governments have to be prudent and serious,” said Carolina Toha, a Chilean government spokeswoman, denouncing the espionage claims against two Chilean military officials.
“We want to be clear: Chile does not spy,” she said.
A Peruvian court earlier began extradition proceedings against the two Chilean officers, as the government launched an official inquiry, justice officials in Lima said.
The Chileans, identified as Daniel Marquez Torrealba and Victor Vergara Rojas, were allegedly working with an officer of the Peruvian air force, Victor Ariza Mendoza, whose detention officials announced on Thursday.
News reports said that Ariza, who worked in 2002 in Peru’s embassy in Santiago, has been charged with “revealing state secrets, money laundering and espionage” on behalf of Chile since September 2005.
Ariza, who reportedly confessed, would have earned US$3,000 a month for his involvement in passing on information, prosecutors said. Authorities said they were also looking into the possible involvement of another Peruvian military officer in the case.
The rift is the most serious in years between the two neighbors, which have had a long-running dispute over their maritime border in the Pacific Ocean.
Peru filed suit against Chile last year at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, disputing the border and demanding more of the Pacific Ocean fishing waters between them.
Chile says the maritime border was settled by treaties in 1952 and 1954 — treaties that Peru argues were meant to regulate fishing, not demarcate the border.
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