Judges at the International Court of Justice ruled on Thursday that Colombia must “immediately cease” patrolling and trying to control fishing in parts of the Caribbean that the ICJ said are within Nicaragua’s exclusive economic zone.
The ICJ ruled that Colombian activities in the Nicaraguan zone, including giving out fishing rights to others and interfering with maritime research, violated Nicaragua’s sovereign rights.
In 2012, the world court handed down a judgment that reduced the expanse of sea belonging to Colombia.
The new sea borders increased Nicaragua’s continental shelf and economic exclusion zone in the Caribbean, giving it access to underwater oil and gas deposits, as well as fishing rights in those waters.
Joseph Jessie, a representative of the Afro-Caribbean ethnic group which lives on the Colombian islands of San Andres and Providencia, said in an audio shared by the foreign ministry that he felt a sense of “mission accomplished” because the court recognized his community’s fishing rights.