International legal battle between Chevron, Indigenous Ecuadorians continues in Ontario court

07/10/2017 - http://www.cbc.ca

A legal battle between Chevron and Indigenous villagers from Ecuador, spanning several decades and across three countries, is now playing out in Canada as Ontario courts consider whether to enforce foreign judgments here.

• Ecuadorians face off against Chevron in Ontario court over $9.5B US award

In 2011, Chevron Corp., the third-largest oil company in the United States, was ordered to pay $9.5 billion by an Ecuadorian court to compensate 30,000 Indigenous villagers living in the Lago Agrio region of Ecuador for environmental damages.

The villagers claimed Chevron was responsible for extensive environmental damage caused by oil-drilling activities by Texaco, Inc., which ended more than 20 years ago and before Chevron acquired ... Read more

Eriberto Gualinga, my people the Sarayaku’s fight against oil and gas

25/10/2016 - http://www.lifegate.com/

Ecuador was found guilty of granting indigenous Sarayaku land to an oil and gas company. We speak to community member Eriberto Gualinga to find out what has changed since.

It has been four years since the Inter-American Court of Human Rights found Ecuador guilty of granting the ancestral land of the Sarayaku in concession to an oil and gas company. The community of about 1,200 indigenous Kichwa people is situated along the Bobonaza River, in the southern part of the Ecuadorian Amazon.

In 2012, the Court reaffirmed the right of indigenous groups to be consulted on projects that affect their territories, safeguarding the right to land of all communities that have based their economy, culture and religion on their relationship and synergy with nature. In order to discover what has happened ... Read More

Yasuni Man film is an intimate portrait of a beautiful land under siege for its oil

12/10/2016 - www.theguardian.com

Watching a film-maker use tweezers to extract wriggling, inch-long Amazonian parasites from his bloody leg would normally rank among the more stomach-churning of cinematic experiences, but it is a mere sideshow in a new documentary that shows Ecuador’s most famous nature reserve faces far graver threats than it poses.

Over the past seven years, US biologist Ryan Killackey has endured bot fly larvae, dysentery, bullet ant stings and malignant melanoma in order to film an intimate and polemical account of a remote forest community under pressure from US and Chinese oil companies.

The result is Yasuni Man, a 90-minute record of a stunningly beautiful region believed to be one of the most biodiverse on the planet at a particularly troubled time in its history.

It focuses on the Yasuni biosphere reserve, which inspired hope around the world in 2007 when the Ecuadorian government announced a global... Read More

Indigenous activist advocates passionately for her community and her land

Indigenous leader Patricia Gualinga (center) speaks with Leila Salazar-López (left)
 and Alec Baldwin about her activism at the Social Good Summit on Sept. 19, 2016.

19/09/2016 - http://mashable.com/

Indigenous leader Patricia Gualinga lives in the middle of the Amazon rainforest, where oil, minerals and lumber are abundant. She says her people, the Kichwa people of Sarayaku, are one with the land. 

It's land companies and miners are hungry to destroy. But Gualinga won't let that happen.

For the past 25 years, Gualinga has been tirelessly dedicated to keeping oil, mineral and lumber extraction off of Sarayaku land.

At the 2016 Social Good Summit on Monday, Gualinga — who is the international representative for the Kichwa of Sarayaku of the Ecuadorian Amazon — spoke with actor and advocate Alec Baldwin about her fight to keep indigenous land pure, while also curbing climate change. Gualinga's answers were translated into English for the discussion by Leila Salazar-López, executive director of ... Read More

Members of Sarayaku Tribe from Ecuador joins Dakota Access Pipeline protesters at Sacred Stone Camp

14/09/2016 - http://www.kfyrtv.com/

Authorities arrested five more people Wednesday for their involvement in chaining themselves to Dakota Access Pipeline construction equipment.

Meanwhile at the Sacred Stone camp near Cannon Ball, Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chairman Dave Archambault welcomed a tribal leader from Ecuador.

Archambault says hosting dozens of tribes over the last several weeks shows how strong the solidarity is for the anti-Dakota Access movement.

The visitor spoke through a translator.

"We're fighting to protect our rivers and our lands. So he is calling upon the people from here, everyone that lives... Read More

Ecuador Announces First Commercial Barrel of Oil from Yasuní's ITT Fields

07/09/2016 - http://amazonwatch.org/

From deep inside the most biodiverse part of Earth's largest rainforest, there is terrible news: Oil extraction has begun in quite possibly the worst place imaginable.

Commercial oil production has begun at Tiputini C, the first of a slated 200-plus wells inside the ITT fields (Ishpingo, Tambococha,Tiputini) underneath Ecuador's Yasuni National Park. The remote UNESCO Biosphere Reserve that borders Peru has some of the highest species of birds, mammals, amphibians, insects, and trees ever recorded. In just one hectare it has more tree species than there are in all of the United States and Canada combined, an area that is one billion times that size. Scientists believe that Yasuní's unique concentration of biodiversity and hotspot of endemic species are due to a climate that allowed species to survive the Ice Age.

The park is also home to the Tagaeri-Taromenane, two indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation. Drilling and planned expansion into the park is a virtual death sentence for them, surrounding the nomadic peoples with oil... Read More

WHERE DID THE SWALLOWS GO? CLIMATE CHANGE HAS ARRIVED IN BRAZIL'S XINGU INDIGENOUS PARK

03/09/2016 - https://intercontinentalcry.org

Climate Change is no longer some abstract idea that we can debate or dismiss. In Brazil's Xingu Indigenous Park, climate change has arrived.

The signs are everywhere. Cicadas no longer announce that the rain is coming. Swallows no longer fly in droves to announce the start of the rains. The butterflies are gone. The Monkeys are gone. Trees are refusing to blossom. Fruit and staple foods like cassava and potato are going rotten before they mature. Fires rage out of control, tearing through the rainforest with alarming ease. And it's getting hotter.

This film by Instituto Socioambiental and Instituto Catitu looks at the devastating causes and effects of these changes that threaten not only... Read More

Peru Oil Pipeline's 4th Leak Spills More Crude in the Amazon

11/08/2016 - http://www.telesurtv.net/

The company behind the spill, Petroperu, has not released an estimate of the amount of oil leaked or the extent of environmental damage.

Communities in the Peruvian Amazon are facing a new environmental disaster as a 40-year-old pipeline operated by state oil company Petroperu has experienced a major oil spoll for the fourth time this year.

The company reported that the 93-mile (150 km) long Nieva River has not been impacted by the leak and that Petroperu is taking steps to protect the area’s water sources. It claimed that the response is “advancing rapidly” to contain the spill and remediate the area... Read More

An Isolated Tribe Emerges From The Rain Forest

08/08/2016 - http://www.newyorker.com/

Before Nicolás (Shaco) Flores was killed, deep in the Peruvian rain forest, he had spent decades reaching out to the mysterious people called the Mashco Piro. Flores lived in the Madre de Dios region—a vast jungle surrounded by an even vaster wilderness, frequented mostly by illegal loggers, miners, narco-traffickers, and a few adventurers. For more than a hundred years, the Mashco had lived in almost complete isolation; there were rare sightings, but they were often indistinguishable from backwoods folklore.

Flores, a farmer and a river guide, was a self-appointed conduit between the Mashco and the region’s other indigenous people, who lived mostly in riverside villages. He provided them with food and machetes, and tried to lure them out of the forest. But in 2011, for unclear reasons, the relationship broke down; one afternoon, when the Mashco appeared on the riverbank and beckoned to Shaco, he ignored them. A week later, as he tended his vegetable patch, a bamboo arrow flew out of the forest, piercing his heart. In Peru’s urban centers, the incident generated lurid news stories about savage natives attacking peaceable settlers. After a few days, though, the attention subsided, and life in the Amazonian backwater returned to its usual obscurity.

In the following years, small groups of Mashco began to venture out of the forest, making fleeting appearances to travellers on the Madre de Dios River. A video of one such encounter, which circulated on the Internet, shows a naked Mashco man brandishing a bow and arrow at a boatload of tourists. In another, the same man carries a plastic bottle of soda that he has just been given. Mostly, the Mashco approach outsiders with friendly, if skittish, curiosity, but at times they have raided local... Read More

HEALTH CONCERNS, FOOD INSECURITY LINGER MONTHS AFTER PERUVIAN OIL SPILLS

25/07/2016 - www.news.mongabay.com

On June 24, reports surfaced that once again the Northern Peruvian Pipeline was leaking oil into Peru’s Marañon River. It was the pipeline’s third major spill this year, after one on January 25 along the Chiriaco River in the region of Amazonas (called the Chiriaco spill) and another on February 3 near the Morona River in the region of Loreto (called the Morona spill). The 40-year-old pipeline has suffered at least 20 spills in the past 5 years alone.

The pipeline, which snakes over 530 miles across the country, belongs to Petroperú, Peru’s state-sponsored oil company. The company’s cleanup efforts for the three recent spills have focused on mitigating the long-term environmental impacts of the oil. But the repercussions for the 8,000-plus mostly indigenous people affected by the spills, whose livelihoods depend on the rivers and land, appear likely to... Read More

Ecuador paga 112 millones de dólares a petrolera Chevron

22/07/2016 - http://www.eluniverso.com/

Ecuador pagó este viernes 112 millones de dólares a la empresa petrolera estadounidense Chevron, cumpliendo un reciente fallo de una corte federal de Washington, la que confirmó una sentencia previa por denegación de justicia en este país.

Un funcionario de esa empresa, que requirió el anonimato porque no estaba autorizado a dar la información, confirmó a la agencia AP que Ecuador pagó los 96,3 millones de dólares más intereses para un total de... Ver más

In Chevron’s Ecuador Case, Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied But, Hey, Football Season’s About To Begin...

07/07/2016 - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/

What does superstar quarterback Tom Brady and a group of Ecuadorian indigenous tribes suing Chevron for massive oil contamination have in common?

They both had lawsuits heard in U.S. federal trial court and appealed to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan. That, however, is where any similarity ends.

Brady — who only wants to play football — got his decision from the appellate court only 4 weeks after oral argument.

The Ecuadorians, who only want to survive on their ancestral lands without being poisoned by oil waste? They are still waiting, 64 weeks after their oral argument... Read More

Estado debe cumplir dictamen judicial del Ecuador y no norteamericano

06/07/2016 - http://texacotoxico.net/

La Unión de Afectados por Texaco (UDAPT), considera que sería muy grave y un “atraco al país”, si el Estado llega a pagar a Chevron en lugar de hacer efectiva la orden de embargo en favor de los indígenas y campesinos que lograron una sentencia para que la petrolera pague para la reparación de los daños ambientales provocados en las provincias de Sucumbíos y Orellana.

Humberto Piaguaje, coordinador de la UDAPT, informó que hasta el momento el Presidente de la Corte Provincial de Sucumbíos no ha emitido los oficios con los que se notifica el embargo impuesto a los activos y bienes de Chevron en Ecuador y que está vigente desde junio del 2013, lo que resulta bastante extraño.  Si el Estado llega a pagar a Chevron por falta... Ver más

Ecuador tiene plazo hasta el 20 de julio para pagar $ 96,3 millones a Chevron

Foto: Mauricio Muñoz/ Presidencia de la República

05/07/2016 - http://www.larepublica.ec/

Ecuador (AP) — Ecuador busca un acuerdo de pago para cancelar 96,3 millones de dólares a Chevron y cumplir con un fallo judicial que le impuso esa sanción en una demanda del gigante petrolero, informó el martes el ministro de Finanzas, Fausto Herrera.

En una conferencia de prensa señaló que “estamos trabajando con la procuraduría … conjuntamente y llegar a un acuerdo de pago con Chevron “.

Manifestó que “nos dieron un plazo, el 20 de julio, y tenemos que hacer una propuesta conjuntamente con la procuraduría para ver cómo cumplimos”.

El presidente Rafael Correa, en la misma conferencia de prensa, agregó que “me acaban de informar que nos han dado hasta el 20 de julio para pagar eso... Ver más

A Journey to the Front Lines of Ecuador’s Next Oil Battle

30/03/2016 - http://amazonwatch.org/

UPDATE: As we write, the Ecuadorian government has just announced that it began drilling the controversial ITT (Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputini) oil field in Yasuní National Park. The well platform, known as Tiputini C, is on the border of the park, while the rest of the field and Block 43 concession overlaps what is widely understood as one of the most biodiverse places on the planet and home to indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation. The government hopes to extract the first oil by the end of 2016... Read more

Recognizing the Rights of Nature and the Living Forest

02/02/2016 - http://ecowatch.com/

“The message our Living Forest proposal delivers is aimed at the entire world with the goal of reaching the hearts and minds of human beings everywhere, encouraging us all to reflect on the close relation between Human Rights and the Rights of Nature.”‎ —From Kawsak Sacha, The Living Forest: An Indigenous Proposal for Confronting Climate Change, presented by the Amazonian Kichwa People of Sarayaku, Ecuador

December 2015 found all eyes on Paris as government representatives from around the world debated and finalized a new international climate change agreement at the United Nations COP21 climate negotiations. The news was abuzz with stories and analysis about the Paris agreement and the commitments (or lack thereof) made by world governments, however it was just outside of the narrow glance of the mainstream media that actions and events for... Read More

One-Third of Ecuador's Rainforests to Be Auctioned Off to Chinese Oil Companies

27/01/2016 - http://www.latinpost.com/

Almost two years after a controversial bid by the country's politicians to auction off part of the Amazon Rainforest to Chinese oil drilling companies, the it seems like the deal is finally about to get finalized, according to The Business Insider.

If the deal does go through, China would be free to exploit about 3 million of the country's 8.1 million hectares of pure, untouched Amazonian rainforest. The region has remained pristine despite the advent of industrialization, until now.

Areas of the Amazon are widely believed to carry vast deposits of oil, one of the global ... Read More

Ecuador to Sign Contracts for Two Controversial Amazonian Oil Blocks

20/01/2016 - http://amazonwatch.org/

Quito, Ecuador – The Ecuadorian government has announced imminent plans to sign contracts for two controversial Amazonian oil blocks which are facing adamant opposition from local indigenous people residing within the roughly half-a-million acre concessions and beyond. The blocks, known as 79 and 83, overlap with the territory of the Sápara indigenous people, a small threatened group of only 300 which has official recognition by UNESCO as an "Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity".
The two problematic blocks border Yasuní National Park and a government protected area for the nomadic Tagaeri and Taromenane indigenous groups living in... Read more

Canada’s Supreme Court Says Ecuadoreans Can Sue Chevron

04/09/2015 - http://www.americanlawyer.com/

Canada’s highest court pushed a reset button Friday on a group of Ecuadorean villagers’ quest to enforce a $9.5 billion environmental judgment based on accusations that Chevron ravished the Amazon rainforest in Ecuador.

The Supreme Court of Canada held that Ontario courts have jurisdiction over a lawsuit that the Ecuadorean plaintiffs filed in 2012 as an attempt to collect on the mega-judgment against the energy giant.

The plaintiffs, villagers from Ecuador’s rural Lago Agrio region, had in 2011 secured a ruling from an Ecuadorean court that put Chevron on the hook for $19 billion, although that amount was slashed on appeal to... Read more

Ecuador Protests: Correa's Oil Crisis, Policies Could Spell End Of Latin America Success Story

20/08/2015 - http://www.ibtimes.com/

A vast array of disparate groups, including indigenous communities, medical associations, teachers' unions, senior citizens and business owners, have all come out in full force across Ecuador in recent weeks to put their discontent on display, marching through streets, blocking roads, waving flags and shouting slogans. Each group touts a different laundry list of complaints and demands, but they are all targeted at one man: Ecuador’s President Rafael Correa.

Once considered one of the world's most popular leaders, Correa has seen his approval ratings tumble in recent months amid plummeting oil prices, growing debt and repressive tactics against dissenters, triggering outcry from a noticeably diverse swath of Ecuadorian society. It's a significant shift for Correa, who was once hailed as a modernizer whose policies helped Ecuador become the third-fastest growing country in Latin America and boast the region’s most dramatic decline in poverty over the past seven... Read more