World Notes Canada

The U.S. and Canada have traditionally boasted that they share the world's longest undefended border. Last week, however, the two countries remained at odds over just where one begins and the other ends. (

The dispute focuses on a piece of Alaska that extends 500 miles south along the British Columbia coast. Canadians deny U.S. claims that the strip's boundaries encompass some 300 sq. mi. of rich fishing grounds near British Columbia's Queen Charlotte Islands. In August, Joe Clark, Canada's Minister of External Affairs, rejected a request from Secretary of State George Shultz to negotiate the issue.

State Department officials downplayed the snub. In the absence of a definitive boundary agreement, both U.S. and Canadian fishermen will keep plying the bountiful waters.