UPDATE
***********************************************
FOREST
CONSERVATION NEWS TODAY
Pipeline
Construction Blockaded in Ecuadorian Rainforest Reserve
***********************************************
Forest
Networking a Project of Forests.org, Inc.
http://forests.org/ -- Forest Conservation
Portal
http://forests.org/links/ -- Forest
Conservation Links
10/15/01
OVERVIEW
& COMMENTARY by Forests.org
Dozens
of women and children have commenced a peaceful blockade to
stop
construction of Ecuador's new oil pipeline that threatens to
devastate
the country's rainforests and local peoples.
The pipeline
will
allow Ecuador to double its current oil production, setting off
an
unprecedented boom in new oil exploration.
This is likely to
cause the
irreversible loss and destruction of some the country's
last
remaining old growth rainforests and territories of isolated
indigenous
peoples. As currently routed the
pipeline will devastate
11
protected forest areas including the Mindo Nambillo Cloudforest
Reserve
- home to some 450 species of birds.
This list's members
have
been active participants in email campaigns to halt this
project. Despite government approval, whether the
pipeline will be
built
is far from certain. Below is an excellent
update and
extensive
background information on the situation from the Rainforest
Action
Network, as well as their suggestions for taking action and
directing
protests at the project's financiers.
g.b.
*******************************
RELAYED
TEXT STARTS HERE:
ITEM#1
Title: Controversial Pipeline Construction
Blockaded in Ecuadorian
Cloud Forest Reserve - Local Women and
Children Protest Citigroup-
Backed Project
Source: Copyright 2001 Rainforest Action Network
Date: October 12, 2001
PRESS
RELEASE
(Guarumos,
Ecuador) - Ecuadorian groups announced that dozens of
women
and children yesterday began a peaceful blockade of OCP
Consortium
machinery as it attempted to clear protected forests to
build
Ecuador's new heavy crude pipeline. The building of the
pipeline
along its current route, funded in part by Citigroup, will
devastate
11 protected forest areas and lead to the doubling of oil
production
from National Parks and other protected areas in the
Ecuadorian
Amazon and have a devastating impact on local communities.
As of 4
pm EST, an estimated 40 people from local communities
affected
by the pipeline were participating in the successful
blockade.
"The blockade has virtually stopped the crews from
destroying
this globally significant cloud forest reserve," said
environmental
group Acci>n Ecol>gica, noting that a resistance camp
will be
maintained in Los Guarumos region on the Non-Tandapaya Road,
an
approximately 2 hour drive from Quito.
Opposition
to the construction of Ecuador's new Heavy Crude Oil
Pipeline
(OCP) has captured international headlines. Unsuccessful in
their
attempts to use legal channels to change the planned route of
the
pipeline, environmental groups have put pressure on investment
companies
responsible for the financial backing behind the pipeline.
In
particular, Westdeustche Landesbank (WestLB), Germany's largest
bank
and Citigroup have been pressured by activists to use their
financial
influence to alter the route of the pipeline and guarantee
protection
of Yasuni National Park, an environmentally critical
forest
area planned to be drilled for short-term oil profits. WestLB
has
arranged a $900 million financing package for the OCP consortium
and
Citigroup is the financial backer of primary consortium member
Perez-Companc,
who owns the drilling rights to areas within Yasuni
National
Park.
The
pipeline consortium also includes Techint, Alberta Energy,
Repsol-YPF,
AGIP, Kerr-McGee and the Los Angeles-based Occidental
Petroleum,
already the subject of protest campaigns for their
controversial
oil projects in Colombia.
Environmental
and public health problems with pipeline spills in
Ecuador
are ongoing. In May, the country's existing pipeline ruptured
due to
a landslide, spilling 7,000 barrels of oil. This accident was
the
14th major oil spill since 1998. The Mindo area includes steep
and
unstable slopes where there is a high risk of oil spills.
The
Mindo inhabitants want to focus international attention on their
stance
in defense of endangered species and globally important
ecosystems.
They urge U.S. energy users to support a more rapid
transition
to clean energy alternatives given that half of the oil
from
the OCP pipeline will be destined for West Coast US markets.
Citigroup
is the subject on an ongoing campaign for funding
controversial
fossil fuel and logging projects in endangered
ecosystems.
In addition to their participation in OCP, they have
leadership
roles in the Camisea project in Peru, the Chad-Cameroon
pipeline
in Africa, and the PetroZuata project in the Orinoco Delta
in
Venezuela.
Press
Contacts:
In US:
Ilyse
Hogue, Rainforest Action Network: 415-398-4404,
Janet
Lloyd, Amazon Watch: 310-455-0617
In
Ecuador:
Alexandra
Almeida, Acci>n Ecol>gica 011 593 22 547-516 or 527-583
Related
Links:
TAKE
ACTION!
CALL
Citi's investor relations :
1-888-250-3985
and dial 0 until you reach a human operator
Tell
them to use their influence to halt this destructive project and
to stop
funding destructive activities such as fossil fuel
development
and logging.
CALL/FAX
the Ecuadorian Embassy in DC :
Tel.
202-2347200 Fax 202-667-3482
Let
them know that the world is watching to insure that these
activists
are allowed to voice their dissent in safety. Tell them
that
you are a potential eco-tourist who doesn't want to see
Ecuador's
spectacular forest reserves like the Mindo-Nambillo Cloud
Forest
threatened by the OCP pipeline.
Call
the NY offices of German bank West LB at 212-852-6000
Tell
them to cancel the project and redirect their investments
towards
renewable energy development that will help the people of
Ecuador
without threatening biological and cultural diversity.
ORGANIZE
SOLIDARITY DEMONSTRATIONS at you local Ecuadorian consulate.
The
locations of all Ecuadorian consulates in North America are at
http://www.ecuador.org/visa.html#ConsulatesofEcuador
For a
full background info on OCP and oil development's destructive
legacy
in Ecuador See Amazon Watch's Report "The New Heavy Crude
Pipeline
in Ecuador: Fueling a Second Oil Boom in the Amazon" at
www.amazonwatch.org
For
more resources and assistance in organize against Citigroup in
your
community check out www.ran.org or
contact Rainforest Action
Network
at 1-800-989-RAIN or email organize@ran.org
ITEM#2
Title: CITIGROUP FUNDS PROPOSED ECUADORIAN PIPELINE
WHICH THREATENS FRAGILE ECOSYSTEMS AND
COMMUNITIES
Source: Copyright 2001 Rainforest Action Network
Date: October 12, 2001
To See
RAN's case study on Citigroup and OCP check out :
http://www.ran.org/ran_campaigns/citigroup/cs_ocp.html
Ignoring
the devastating toll thirty years of reckless oil
development
has taken on the country of Ecuador - particularly on the
Amazon
and its people - the government and a consortium of
multinational
oil companies are poised to make the same irreversible
mistake
by moving ahead with a controversial new oil pipeline project
known
as the OCP (Oleoducto de Crudo Pesado).
Among the
consortium's
main funders is Citigroup - the world's most destructive
bank. As the number one funder of oil pipelines
around the world it
is no
surprise to find Citi playing a central role with yet another
massive,
destructive fossil fuel project.
Financially
backed by Citigroup, J.P. Morgan Chase Bank, and Deutsche
Bank,
the OCP consortium is comprised of Alberta Energy (Canada),
Kerr
McGee (USA), Occidental Petroleum (USA) - notorious for their
invasion
of the U'wa people's land in Colombia, AGIP (Italy), Perez
Companc
(Argentina), Repsol-YPF (Spain) and Techint (Argentina). The
pipeline
would transport heavy crude from the country's eastern
rainforest
region to the Pacific Coast, placing fragile ecosystems
and
dozens of communities along the 300-mile route in jeopardy.
The
pipeline route chosen by the OCP consortium affects 11 protected
areas,
and cuts through the middle of the Mindo Nambillo Cloudforest
Reserve
and the surrounding ecologically sensitive forests. This
area is
home to more than 450 species of birds---46 of which are
threatened
by extinction --and has been designated the first
"Important
Bird Area" of South America by Birdlife International.
The
pipeline also represents a threat to the area's burgeoning eco-
tourism
industry, which is expected to bring in $600 million over the
next 20
years.
In
order to fill the new pipeline, Ecuador would have to double its
current
oil production, setting off an unprecedented boom in new oil
exploration
that could lead to the irreversible loss and destruction
of some
the country 's last remaining old growth rainforest and
territories
of isolated indigenous peoples.
Hundreds of new oil
wells and
flow lines would be built from existing oil concessions
along
with facilities necessary to process and refine the heavy crude
for
transport across the country. These
activities threaten
protected
areas such as Yasuni National Park, Cuyabeno Wildlife
Reserve,
and the Limoncocha and Panacocha Biological Reserves. This
project
would also fuel the search for additional oil reserves
covering
2.4 million hectares of frontier forest, the majority of
which
falls on the ancestral territories of Achuar, Shuar, Huaorani,
Quichua,
Shiwiar, and Zapara indigenous communities.
Many of these
communities
have vowed to never permit oil development on their land.
Prominent
Ecuadorian and international environmental and human rights
organizations
are calling for the cancellation of the OCP project and
a
moratorium on all new oil exploration in the country's Amazon
region.
CONAIE, the powerful national indigenous organization whose
non-violent
uprisings have led to the ousting of two presidents in
the
last five years, is joining environmental groups and local
communities
in filing for a legal injunction in the coming weeks to
void
the OCP contract with the government.
The
Ecuadorian government, the OCP consortium, and the financiers
have
failed to fully assess or disclose the long-term impacts of the
new OCP
pipeline on ecologically and culturally sensitive areas in
the
Amazon region or the coast. The
government squashed all public
debate
on these concerns by closing the public review process a mere
three
weeks after the release of the 1,500-page Environmental Impact
Assessment
and fast tracking licensing.
Ecuador's
oil exports are primarily destined for consumption in the
United
States, particularly in California. Not
only does this
pipeline
threaten fragile areas and local communities, it further
increases
our reliance on oil - the main fossil fuel responsible for
climate
change. We must call on the involved
financial institutions
to stop
bankrolling destruction of the Amazon and environmental
injustice
and urge them to invest in renewable energy alternatives -
not
Amazon crude!
###RELAYED
TEXT ENDS###
In
accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is
distributed
without profit to those who have expressed a prior
interest
in receiving forest conservation informational materials for
educational,
personal and non-commercial use only.
Recipients should
seek
permission from the source to reprint this PHOTOCOPY. All
efforts
are made to provide accurate, timely pieces, though ultimate
responsibility
for verifying all information rests with the reader.
For
additional forest conservation news & information please see the
Forest
Conservation Portal at URL= http://forests.org/
Networked
by Forests.org, Inc., gbarry@forests.org