Belize and Guatemala

Logwood and a treaty

British settlers came to the coast in the 17th century to cut logwood, a dyewood. Spain let these “Baymen” cut wood in a small area from 1763, still under Spanish sovereignty, and set the settlement’s limits by treaty in 1783 and 1786. Central America broke away from Spain in 1821, and by the time it split into separate republics in 1838 the settlers had pushed far south of those limits.^[3]

Britain then pressed Guatemala to sign a boundary treaty based on the ground the settlers actually held. The Anglo-Guatemalan Treaty was ratified by both sides in 1859, and the colony became British Honduras in 1862.^[3] A note drawn from the US State Department says neither Spain nor Guatemala ever exercised effective sovereignty over the area.^[4]

The road that was never built

Article 7 of the treaty called on both sides to build a means of communication from the Guatemalan highlands to the Caribbean coast. An additional convention of 1863 had Britain pay £50,000 towards a road, but Guatemala did not ratify it in time and it lapsed.^[3] For decades both sides still treated the treaty as valid and worked to mark the border.^[3] Belize’s government says boundary monuments were rebuilt in 1929 and that Guatemala accepted them in an exchange of letters in 1931.^[5]

In 1939 Guatemala declared the treaty void on the grounds that Britain had broken Article 7; Belize’s government dates the formal declaration to 1946.^[3][5] Guatemala argues that the treaty was one of cession and is void because Britain did not keep its side; Belize says it is a boundary treaty, and that Article 7 only promised both sides’ “best efforts”.^[4][5] A threat of invasion followed, and Britain stationed troops in the colony.^[3]

Independence with a claim attached

A 1981 “Heads of Agreement” between Belize, Guatemala and Britain was never implemented, and Belize became independent on 21 September 1981 with the dispute unresolved.^[4] British troops stayed on as a defence guarantee.^[3] Guatemala recognised Belize in 1991 and the two established diplomatic relations, but Guatemala made clear it did not accept Belize’s borders.^[4][3] In 2000 they agreed on an “adjacency zone” reaching 1 km either side of the border line.^[4]

To The Hague

On 8 December 2008 the two countries signed a Special Agreement asking the International Court of Justice to rule on “any and all legal claims of Guatemala against Belize to land and insular territories and to any maritime areas”, and to fix the boundaries. Both promised to accept the ruling as final. Each country first had to approve the step by referendum.^[1] Guatemalans voted yes on 15 April 2018, about 95% in favour on a turnout of about 25%.^[1][3] Belizeans voted yes on 8 May 2019, and the case formally reached the Court on 7 June 2019.^[1]

In September 2025, a former Guatemalan vice-minister of foreign affairs, Rodrigo Vielmann, described Guatemala’s written case as claiming all Belizean land south of the Sibun River, just beyond the capital, Belmopan, as well as all of Belize’s cayes and the sea off its coast.^[2] The claim overlaps another case: Belize has asked the Court to confirm its sovereignty over the Sapodilla Cayes against Honduras, and on 19 March 2026 the Court let Guatemala intervene in that case to protect its own claim to them.^[6]