Tag Archive for 'chevron'

Chevron Guilty Verdict Upheld by Ecuador Appellate Court

Published on 01/06/2012 in contaminated water, displacement of people, oil, policy and waterborne diseases. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Photo retrieved from: www.thechevronpit.com

“Ecuadorian appellate court upheld a historic $18 billion award against Chevron for the company’s deliberate contamination of the Ecuadorian Amazon. The decision is the largest environmental award ever handed down and the result of an 18-year legal battle brought by some 30,000 indigenous peoples and farmers seeking a clean up of contaminated sites, clean drinking water, and health care.

Amazon Watch and Rainforest Action Network, which have spent years fighting on the side of the Ecuadorians in their effort to hold Chevron accountable for these egregious environmental crimes and human rights abuses, release the following statement in response to the verdict:

“For a second time, in a jurisdiction of its own choosing, Chevron was found guilty of widespread oil contamination in Ecuador’s Amazon. It is a historic triumph for the thousands of victims who have suffered for over four decades from Chevron’s drill-and-dump practices.”

Read more: Amazon Watch

 

lily victoria

Ecuador Court Orders Chevron To Pay $8 billion

Published on 02/14/2011 in contaminated water, deforestation, displacement of people, groundwater, lakes, oil, policy, rivers, sink holes, solutions and outreach, wastewater, water wars and waterborne diseases. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

About 916 pits were used by Texaco Petroleum, the US oil major, and PetroEcuador, the state company, for the 23 years before Texaco’s exit from the country in 1992. Photo retrieved from: www.http://pangaea-yep.com

“A court in Ecuador’s Amazon jungle ordered Chevron Corp to pay more than $8 billion in damages on Monday in a closely watched environmental suit, the plaintiffs’ lawyer said.

But the U.S. oil company vowed to appeal, meaning the long-running case dating from drilling in the South American nation during the 1970s and 1980s could last for years more.

The case, which activists portray as a fight for justice against rich polluters but Chevron says is more to do with opportunism, has triggered related legal action in U.S. courts and international arbitration.

It is being monitored by the oil industry for precedents that could lead to other large claims. Chevron had expected to lose the case in the Ecuadorean court.

In a statement on Monday, Chevron did not give any figure from the ruling by the court in Lago Agrio, but said it believed the judgment was “illegitimate” and “unenforceable in any court that observes the rule of law.”

It said the United States and international tribunals had already taken steps to bar enforcement of the ruling.

Pablo Fajardo, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said the court had ordered Chevron to pay more than $8 billion damages.

The lawsuit had originally demanded $27 billion.

LENGTHY APPEALS

Residents of Ecuador’s Amazon region have said faulty drilling practices by Texaco, which was bought by Chevron in 2001, caused damage to wide areas of jungle and harmed indigenous people in the 1970s and 1980s.”

Read more: Los Angeles Times

lily victoria

Exposed: Chevron’s Cover-up of Gross Environmental Abuses in Ecuador

Published on 03/09/2010 in contaminated water and rivers. 1 Comment Tags: , , , , , , , .

“In 1964, it started. That was the year they made the first well at Lago Agrio. But we didn’t know that petroleum was a contaminant. It was with the help of the Summer Institute of Linguistics [a missionary group] that we found out that it was a carcinogen and that it would cause different kinds of illnesses. Two of my children died from drinking contaminated water. Since then, we don’t drink any water from the Aguarico River, because it’s completely contaminated with oil, so we don’t even bathe in it. We have to look for a spring or catch rainwater. We’ve gotten exactly three things from the company: pollution, sickness and death; that’s it.”

read more: AlterNet

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