Lines in the sand: Latin America's border fights should head for the history books. (Silicon Jack).

It sounds like a plot for a cheap Hollywood western: Armed men in lawless border area seize territory and declare an independent state. Yet don't expect Clint Eastwood to ride in/and restore order. An arbitrator in a threepiece suit will most likely end this drama.

The border conflict in question is just the lastest to erupt from a century-old mistake by surveyors. The 440-kilometer-square area in dispute is claimed by Nicaragua, even though an 1858 treaty says it belongs to Costa Rica. Meanwhile, separatists living in the region want out of both nations, arguing that the two governments have never provided adequate social services and that a new country they call Airrecu--a local indigenous term meaning "friendship"-could do better.

Anachronistic conflicts are making headlines all over Latin America these days. A dispute between Chile and Peru over a maritime dividing line persists despite a 1999 pact; Guyana and Surinam are fighting over an oil-rich marine area off the Corentyne River that separates the two nations; at least 1,000 Honduran fishermen have been arrested by Nicaragua during the past 10 years over sea rights in the shrimp-rich Gulf of Fonseca; and Venezuela claims Guyana's Florida-sized Essequibo area, home to gold, diamond and timber investments. Caracas argues that it was unfairly stripped of the region in a 19th-century arbitration decision.

Border disputes often date back to colonial times, when boundaries were usually carved out in the absence of proper geographical data. Over the centuries, too, there have been numerous wars over land with tens of thousands of lives lost, between Paraguay and Brazil, among Bolivia, Chile and Peru, and between Bolivia and Paraguay.

More recently, in 1969, El Salvador and Honduras fought the "Soccer War," a border tiff that broke out as the two countries faced off in world soccer competition. It claimed several thousand lives. A 19-day war between Peru and Ecuador in 1995 over disputed Amazon territory killed as many as 1,500 people and cost both sides US$1 billion.

Most disputes, however, have been resolved peacefully. Latin American leaders have turned to third-party arbitration at least 22 times in matters of territorial sovereignty over the past century. In late 2002, Organization of American States (OAS) mediators hammered out an agreement that could finally end a 143-year territorial dispute between Belize and Guatemala, if voters in those two Central American nations accept the terms.

The settlement retains the border between the two countries-Guatemala claimed Belize in its entirety-and suggests measures for sharing resources.

Old-fashinoned. Border battles and con\flicts over sea rights are bad economics. They cost money and prestige-and human lives. Governments desperately need to show investors and trade partners that they are past these old-fashioned squabbles.

Latin American political leaders must be willing to demilitarize areas where there is constant potential for cross-border violence, relying instead on groups like the QAS as a forum and obeying international court decisions. That would free up badly needed cash for decaying health and education systems and should improve trade relations, bolstering investor confidence.

Most importantly, leaders must have the courage to stop playing the nationalist card when soliciting votes. As a young reporter in the early 1980s, I toured the frigid waters of the Beagle Channel as a guest of the Chilean Navy, which took me to a couple of small, sparsely populated islands at the center of a dispute with Argentina.

The growing conflict nearly ended in war before a 1985 treaty awarded the islands to Chile. Still today, I can't fathom why anybody would kill over a piece of land where even sheep were miserable, if not for simple, ugly nationalism.

As Chile's President Ricardo Lagos said recently, "If we remain stuck in these topics, we're not going to devote ourselves to the things we should be doing." He is right, and the list of things to do is certainly long.