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Today the Placencia Peninsula was the scene of the 44th Summit of central American Heads of State. But while the summit was the main event – an historic signing of 13 bi lateral agreements between Belize and Guatemala stole the show.

The agreements have been in the works since the start of the year. They are designed to earnestly build on the idea of confidence building which started at the beginning of 2014. Now as the year end, and after intensive negotiations between both countries, 13 of them have been finalized: they cover Prisoner Exchange Visa Waiver for Students, Deportation, Transmission Interconnection And Grid Connectivity; Stolen Vehicles and many other areas.

Guatemala's President keyed in on the history and meaning of the signing in his remarks in Placencia this afternoon:..

Otto Pérez Molina - President of Guatemala

"Guatemala and Belize will be neighbours forever and for this reason we want to live in peace and we're partners in the development of our populations and it's important to understand that Guatemala does not constitute and will never constitute a threat for Belize."

Hon. Dean Barrow - Prime Minister

"We got here because both of us desire to live in peace, side by side in friendly neighbourly relations. From energy to culture, tourism to migrant workers, these agreement mark seminal moment our relations and bring us a great distance closer to the long over due settlement of the dispute and set us firmly on course to enhance relation, increase good will and draw us nearer to that day when we can confine the claim permanently to the ash heap of history."

The agreements were signed by Foreign Ministers Wilfred Elrington and Carlos Raul Morales this afternoon in Placencia. They have been in the works for months and foreign Minister Morales says he visited Belize 32 times to see them through. As we said, there are 13 of them but as many as a dozen more are still in the works.