{"id":403,"date":"2010-01-25T13:46:49","date_gmt":"2010-01-25T21:46:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/?p=403"},"modified":"2010-01-25T18:02:07","modified_gmt":"2010-01-26T02:02:07","slug":"indigenous-communities-urge-chevron-to-resolve-human-and-environmental-tragedy-in-ecuador","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/?p=403","title":{"rendered":"Indigenous communities urge Chevron to resolve ‘human and environmental tragedy’ in Ecuador"},"content":{"rendered":"

The latest slogan for oil giant Chevron<\/a> is \u201cWe\u2019re in the human energy business.\u201d And Amazon Watch<\/a>, representing indigenous people in rainforest communities in Ecuador, is happy to hear that. Atossa Soltani, executive director of Amazon Watch, recently wrote a letter to Chevron CEO John Watson, explaining why.<\/p>\n

\u201cI write to you on behalf of Amazon Watch to express our hope that as Chief Executive of Chevron Corporation you will have the fortitude and vision to genuinely address the most painful and immediate challenge facing your company \u2013 the Ecuador disaster.<\/param><\/param><\/param><\/embed><\/object><\/p>\n

Our hope is that you will not miss this critical opportunity to resolve the human and environmental tragedy in Ecuador and transform Chevron into the responsible 21st century energy company professed in \u2018The Chevron Way\u2019 and in your \u2018Human Energy\u2019 advertising campaigns.<\/p>\n

Your company is currently facing a $27.3 billion financial liability in Ecuador. We ask that you reflect on Chevron\u2019s handling of the Ecuador situation over the course of the last decade. You should remember Chevron\u2019s Annual General Shareholder Meeting in April 2001 \u2013 on the eve of the Texaco acquisition \u2013 when I delivered to your company a binder, titled \u201cEl Dorado,\u201d with more than 500 pages of comprehensive evidence documenting Texaco\u2019s massive environmental contamination in the Ecuadorian Amazon. At that meeting, I warned Chevron that by acquiring Texaco the company would not only take on the moral responsibility of rectifying the tragedy in the Amazon, but also assume a very costly financial liability.<\/p>\n

Despite increasing shareholder and analyst concern, the growing public demand that Chevron take responsibility for its actions in Ecuador, and the resulting multi-billion liability they have spawned, Amazon Watch has witnessed your company pursue an expensive, ethically questionable, and counterproductive policy with regard to the Ecuador case.<\/p>\n

Mr. Watson, as you surely know, the situation on the ground is dire. Thousands of acres of once pristine rainforest have been devastated by oil pollution. More than 30,000 indigenous peoples and campesinos have been left without clean water to drink. Children play beside toxic waste pits. <\/p>\n

Young women have been ravaged by stomach and uterine cancer due to poisoned water. As you are well aware, Texaco has admitted to having deliberately released 18 billion gallons of toxic wastewater into the waterways of the Ecuadorian Amazon, and to having left hundreds of abandoned unlined pits filled with crude oil and poison sludge over the course of more than two decades of oil operations. And now, as a direct result, a devastating public health crisis has consumed the region.<\/p>\n

We are keenly attuned to Chevron\u2019s public relations strategy with respect to this matter. The basic approach is to consistently blame the contamination of the Amazon on Petroecuador, Ecuador\u2019s National Oil Company. Petroecuador\u2019s poor record of environmental stewardship \u2013 largely because it has used an oil production system built by Texaco and designed to pollute \u2013 does not diminish Texaco\u2019s responsibility for catastrophic contamination from 1964 to 1990. Texaco\u2019s deliberate dumping dwarfs any subsequent pollution. Rather than continuing to shift the blame to Petruecuador, it is time for Chevron to assume the responsibility for Texaco\u2019s legacy in Ecuador…\u201d<\/p>\n

Amazon Watch is a nonprofit group that works to protect the rainforest and advance the rights of indigenous people in the Amazon Basin. The group created this video showing people in the affected communities urging the Chevron CEO to do the right thing in Ecuador by cleaning up the rainforest contamination. <\/p>\n

Amazon Watch has also set up a petition drive to support the rainforest communities\u2019 demands for a clean-up, compensation for health and environmental impacts, and access to health care and potable water for all affected people.<\/p>\n

You can sign the petition here: http:\/\/chevrontoxico.com\/take-action\/send-chevron-a-message.html<\/a><\/p>\n

I first heard of this effort in an email from International Cry<\/a>, a \u201cfree online magazine that provides news, videos, and urgent alerts centered on indigenous people and their struggles around the world to reclaim their lands, defend their traditions, enact their rights, and to quite literally survive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both Amazon Watch and International Cry provide information you\u2019ll seldom see elsewhere, and both groups need our support.<\/p>\n

For more information, here is a link to a blog maintained by the team suing Chevron over its human rights problems in Ecuador and elsewhere: The Chevron Pit<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The latest slogan for oil giant Chevron is \u201cWe\u2019re in the human energy business.\u201d And Amazon Watch, representing indigenous people in rainforest communities in Ecuador, is happy to hear that. Atossa Soltani, executive director of Amazon Watch, recently wrote a letter to Chevron CEO John Watson, explaining why. \u201cI write to you on behalf of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[82],"tags":[83,172,84],"class_list":["post-403","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ecuador","tag-amazon","tag-chevron","tag-indigenous-peoples"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=403"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":407,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403\/revisions\/407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryjohnsononline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}