U.S.-Mexico boundary treaty is dead without support

Since the U.S-Mexico treaty delineating maritime boundaries was tabled in the U.S. Senate in the early 1980s it simply lost momentum, U.S. administration officials say.

According to the State Department's David Colson, the treaty is unlikely to be taken up again until U.S. industry expresses interest in resolving the boundary dispute.

"If the oil and gas industry begins to feel it's time to move forward and that is communicated, there would be a political opening," he said.

"We normally need some constituent support to get a treaty through the Senate."

A Senate foreign relations committee staffer said the treaty is not a high priority for the committee and likely will not come up soon.

By all accounts, Hollis Hedberg's proposed methodologies are not expected to be used in any final resolution of the dispute (see related story, this page).

The American Association of Petroleum Geologists, one of Hedberg's most vocal supporters in the 1980 treaty hearings, has indicated it would no longer oppose the treaty.

Former AAPG Executive Director Fred Dix said, "I rather doubt we would oppose it. The political situation between Mexico and the U.S. has changed so much since then that unless we saw some overwhelming reason to oppose the treaty I don't think we would."

Mexico's dismay

Mexicans knowledgeable about the issue said they are dismayed the treaty had not yet been ratified.

Former Mexican Sen. Fausto Zapata, who presided over the Mexican Senate foreign relations and energy committees when the boundary treaty came up for review and has followed its lack of progress in the U.S., said, "Eighteen years have passed since we ratified the Maritime Limits Treaty between Mexico and the U.S., and the U.S. Senate still has not ratified it. Something this delayed is obviously very worrisome to us."

Jose Manuel Tobayn Baquiero, a ruling lnstitutional Revolutionary Party senator on the foreign relations committee, agreed the delay in ratifying the treaty was worrisome, saying, "It's an ancestral fight. Petroleum has always been a feud between us. It would be better to clear this up so we can avoid unnecessary conflicts between us."