Peru is backed on issue of site of new clashes

February 25, 1981

Peru claimed a diplomatic triumph over Ecuador in their simmering border dispute, which has provoked two outbreaks of fighting within a month. Foreign Minister Javier Arias Stella said Peru's contention that the latest clashes occurred on its territory had been vindicated by a communique issued by four neutral nations. The communique, issued by the United States, Chile, Argentina, and Brazil, said the flare-up of fighting on Friday and Saturday occurred on the eastern [Peruvian] side of the Condor Mountais.

Peru had said on Saturday that it captured three Ecuadorean emplacements inside its territory and that any further incursion would be consid ered an act of war.