Fourteen of the activists were arrested in March when police broke up their camp. Nine internationals were deported and the remaining locals were jailed. After five days they were released because they were not trespassing. The site is actually located on private property that has recently been purchased by the Ecuadorian environmentalist organization known as Accion Ecologica.
Wilfrido Vaca, one of the protest leaders who was arrested, says the whole eco-system of the area is threatened by the new construction. "At one point the pipeline has to go over a ridge that is only 80 centimeters wide, and that is just impossible," he said. "This is also an area of much seismic activity and we are only a few kilometers from two active volcanoes." Before the arrest a number of activists had climbed the trees and built platforms and others were chained to the trunks with the purpose of preventing the building crews from entering the protected area. Environmental and human rights organizations from Ecuador and around the world are calling for the cancellation of the OCP project and a moratorium on all further oil prospecting in the country's forests.
Oil spills are the greatest fear. A visit to the oil fields around the town of Lago Agrio in the Amazon Basin bears witness to the problem. Oil waste is collected in vast pools often on agricultural land, making further cultivation impossible. Gas is burned off giving the impression of giant bunsen burners lighting up the sky. And small spills are shoveled up, put in plastic bags and buried. The whole area reeks of oil and local farmers talk of how the groundwater is contaminated, large black drops forming on the vegetation when it rains. Local people also claim that the vast amount of money made by the oil industry does not trickle down to them.
The chairman of OCP is a Colombian, Hernan Lara. He says that he understands the concerns of the environmentalists, but that it would be wrong to consider not building the pipeline just because it goes through a delicate area.
"The consequences of not completing the pipeline would be very grave," he says. "It would send a message to the international investment community that you can't work in Ecuador. And that would be just the opposite of what's happening at the moment. People are seeing the development of OCP as a signal that changes are taking place in Ecuador, and that it is possible to see it as a money-making proposition in the long term."
The oil pipeline represents the beginning of an unprecedented boom of new oil investments in Ecuador: more than $2 billion to be spent over the next five years for oil prospecting and extraction, oil pipeline feeding, refineries and infrastructure for related processing. A major part of the crude oil necessary to feed the oil pipeline is to be found in the national parks, indigenous lands and in pristine tropical forests.
The Westdeutsche Landesbank (WestLB) has contracted over $1 billion in loans to finance the pipeline. It is facing strong criticism in Germany for violating its own lending policies by financing a project that fails to comply even with the World Bank's low environmental standards. Since WestLB is 50% state-owned, the German government was pressured to get involved. Under-secretary Harald Noack from the German Finance Ministry was in Ecuador recently to review the situation. He was accompanied by the geophysicist, Gustav Brose, and his spokesman, Norbert Greß.
"We collected a large amount of information on the environmental viability and technical aspects of the project," Greß explains. Brose is now putting together an expert's summary of the findings, expected in May. But Brose's results will not halt WestLB's financing or the construction itself. "The contracts for the loans have been signed, and they are legally binding," says Greß.
Should Brose find fault with the proposed route, Greß says one possible solution would be having a consultant on the spot. "He would then monitor every instance of the pipeline project."
OCP ceased construction work in the Mindo cloud forest during this year's unusually intense rainy season that spilled over into May. Construction along the other stretches of the OCP route continues to advance at an amazing rate, overriding the opposition of the people and municipal governments, and in complete violation of constitutional and legal precepts for environmental protection and respect for the rights of the inhabitants of the areas it passes through.
Contrary to what has been said about the benefits it will generate for Ecuador, it is obvious that in the long run another oil pipeline will do more harm than good, and the protest continues. For more information visit www.amazonwatch.org. or e-mail Freeda Burnstad: bnublado@ecuanex.net.ec
Copyright Mendocino Environmental Center 2002
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