Port Authority

Annie Murphy’s “The Day of the Sea” [Letter from La Paz, February] neglects to mention the Treaty of Peace and Friendship signed by Bolivia and Chile in 1904. This agreement normalized relations between the two countries twenty-one years after the War of the Pacific and provided Bolivia with some of the most favorable rights of transit of any nation in the world without a coast.

Under the treaty, Chile allowed Bolivia “the widest and freest right of commercial transit through its territory and Pacific harbors.” This freedom remains. Eighty-one percent of the cargo transported through Arica, a Chilean…