The crux of their disagreement lies in a contract made in 1878, between the Sultanate of Sulu and the British North Borneo Company.

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Fort Defiance, a few blocks north, serves up fresh pasta, small plates like chicken liver pate with bacon-onion jam, and historically-inspired cocktails like the Colonial Cooler, a twist on the Pimm's Cup that was first mixed in British North Borneo in the 1920s.

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The conflict is a relic of the colonial era when the Sultans of Sulu "leased" what used to be North Borneo to the British government for an annual sum of 5, 300 Mexican gold pieces.

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