Honorable Alvaro Uribe
President of the Republic of Colombia
AND
Mr. Isaac Ivanovich
President, ECOPETROL
VIA EMAIL AND FAX
We write you on behalf of 57 non-governmental organizations, representing 12 countries to express our utmost concern with respect to renewed plans by ECOPETROL to initiate seismic testing and oil exploration on legally titled territories of the U’wa indigenous people. The U’wa, a traditional culture of 5,000 people, inhabit territory that spans over 5 departments – much of it pristine, fragile cloud forest, which has sustained the U’wa physically, culturally, and spiritually for millennia.
As you are aware, since the early 1990’s when Occidental Petroleum acquired the Samore / Siriri oil blocks, the U’wa have repeatedly expressed their strong opposition to oil exploitation both within their legally titled reserve, as well as on their ancestral homelands. The U’wa consistently maintain that the project will have tremendous and irreversible environmental, social, and cultural impacts that threaten the integrity and very survival of their people. The protracted struggle that culminated in OXY’s departure captured headlines and media attention worldwide. Thousands of Colombians including rural and farmers’ organizations, union leaders, lawmakers, environmentalists, scholars as well as international investors, scientists, and environmental and human rights defenders organized an unprecedented and truly historic world wide campaign in support of the U’wa people.
Today, the U’wa once again are calling on their allies in Colombia and internationally to declare their solidarity and to support the U’wa in their resistance to oil and gas activities planned in the heart of their territory.
On behalf of the following NGO’s and an international network of more than 5,000 U’wa supporters worldwide, we write to urge your government to permanently abandon your plans for the Siriri and Catleya oil blocks, which overlap a major part of the “U’wa Resguardo Unido.” We call o your government and ECOPETROL to respect the unwavering decision of the U’wa People as expressed by repeated pronouncements by the U’wa Traditional Authority to reject all oil and gas exploration and exploitation on their sacred ancestral homelands.
We remind your government of the 1997 legal complaint brought by the U’wa to the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights of the Organization of American States. At the request of Colombia’s ministry of foreign affairs, a team of OAS-Harvard University investigated the case and made a number of recommendations in June 1998 that the Colombian government subsequently approved in September 1998. Among the recommendations the Colombian government accepted, were three important ones: 1) all oil activities be suspended inside the U’wa territory, 2) that the U’wa territory be delimited and legalized; and 3) that before any oil activities resume in the U’wa territory there be a process for “obtaining the consent of the U’wa to activities proposed for their territory.”
We believe any effort to move forward with oil and gas exploration and production in the Resguardo Unido violates both the spirit and letter of the Colombian government’s agreement to follow the OAS Harvard recommendations. Plans to proceed with the Catleya and Siriri projects without the U’wa’s consent violates both Colombian and international law which guarantee indigenous peoples the right to self determination for activities that affect their territories and way of life.
The U’wa territory contains montane cloudforests that scientists consider to be one of the planet’s most biologically diverse and most endangered ecosystems. The U’wa are traditional people who depend on clean water, intact forests, and biodiversity of flora and fauna for their physical and spiritual survival. The oil project will likely bring pollution, environmental degradation, and violence. It will also have devastating affects on the U’wa culture and way of life. A nearby example of oil activity to the larger U’wa territory is in the department of Arauca, where it has been marred by violence and poor environmental practice, resulting in devastating socio-environmental impacts such as polluted local rivers and streams, soil, and ground water.
The environmental impact of oil extraction is only exacerbated by Colombia’s civil conflict. As has become standard through Colombia’s 40 years of conflict, oil infrastructure has been a magnet for violence, often trapping innocent indigenous communities in the crossfire. The prospect of oil drilling on U’wa land will bring this reality to the heart of U’wa territory and threatens their daily livelihood and future survival.
The eyes of the international community are once again focused on the U’wa, the Colombian government, and this project. We urge you to unconditionally respect the rights and territory of the U’wa, and to abandon your plans of oil and gas exploration and exploitation from within the U’wa reserve and its surrounding area.
Respectfully,
Peter Kostishack
Co-Director
Amazon Alliance
Atossa Soltani
Executive Director
Amazon Watch
Mr Bruce Watson
Assongtaaba
United Kingdom
Wolfgang Kuhlmann
Arbeitsgemeinschaft Regenwald und Artenschutz (ARA)
Germany
Mike Cox
Co-ordinator
Berkshire Climate Movement- UK
United Kingdom
Andrea Smith
Coordinator
Boarding School Healing Project
Lukas Strautmann
Bruno Manser Fonds
Switzerland
Tatiana Roa
Directora de Proyectos
Censat Agua Viva – Friends of the Earth- Colombia
Adam Isacson
Director of Programs
Center for International Policy
Viviana Krsticevic
Executive Director
Center for Justice and International Law- CEJIL
Cristina Espinel
Colombia Human Rights Committee
Bernhard Henselmann
Earthlink
Germany
Miss Rebecca Howarth
Chairperson
Environmental Society of the University of Sussex
United Kingdom
John Lindsay-Poland
Director
Fellowship of Reconciliation- Task Force on Latin America and the Caribbean
Tony Juniper
Executive Director
Friends of the Earth – England, Wales and Northern Ireland
United Kingdom
Sylvia Hamberger
Gesellschaft für ökologische Forschung
Germany
Zach Hurwitz
South America Program Coordinator
Global Exchange
Jon Buckrell
Global Witness
United Kingdom
Daniel Hausknost
GLOBAL 2000
Austria
Viliam Bartús
Green Stone
Slovakia
Tom Goldtooth
Executive Director
Indigenous Environmental Network
Astrid Puentes Riaño
Legal Director
Interamerican Association for Environmental Defense, AIDA
Mexico
Victor Menotti
Program Director
International Forum on Globalization
Grazia Francescato
Female Spokeperson, European Green Party
Deputy, Italian Green Party
Italy
Julie Ann Fishel
Land Recognition Program
Sarah Hutchison
UK Coordinator
Latin America Programme, Species and Forest Team
World Wildlife Fund-UK
United Kingdom
Mark Brown
London Rising Tide
England
Robert Benson
Professor of Law
Loyola Law School, Los Angeles
Nicole Rycroft
Campaigns Director
Markets Initiative: Protecting Ancient Forests. Creating New Markets.
Canada
Esperanza Martinez
Oilwatch Secreteriat
Oilwatch Internactional
Ecuador
Lisardo Domico
General Secretary/ Secretario General
Organizacion National Indigena de Colombia (ONIC)
David Tucker
Executive Director
Pachamama Alliance
Ian Williams
Plan B- The Environment Centre
United Kingdom
Mika Minio-Paluello
Private Finance & Government Policy Co-ordinator
PLATFORM
England
Hermann Edelmann
Pro REGENWALD
Germany
Mike Brune
Executive Director
Rainforest Action Network
John Bennett
Interim Executive Director
Rainforest Foundation-US
Simon Counsell
Rainforest Foundation- UK
United Kingdom
John Seed & Ruth Rosenhek, directors,
Rainforest Information Centre
Australia
Teremy Thres,
Coordinator
Regenco- Land People Spirit.
England
Reinhard Behrend
Rettet den Regenwald
Germany
Peter Gerhardt, Rudolf Fenner
Campaigner for Tropical Forests
Robin Wood
Germany
Hendrik Voss
Networking Coordinator
School of the Americas Watch
Christopher H. Peters
President and CEO
Seventh Generation Fund
Larry Lohmann, Sarah Sexton, Nicholas Hildyard
The Corner House
United Kingdom
Guy Fisher
The Gaia Foundation
England
Frances Grumbly
Executive Director
The Ingrid Washinawatok El-Issa Flying Eagle Woman Fund for Peace, Justice and Sovereignty, Inc.
Michael Duckett
Tyneside Autonomous Social Centre
United Kingdom
Ana Maria Murillo
Director
U’wa Defense Project
Gilles Ramponi
Secretary
UNEL – The National Union of Students from Luxembourg
United Kingdom
Rev. Dr. Mari Castellanos
Justice and Witness Ministries
United Church of Christ
Barbara Gerlach
Colombia Liaison
United Church of Christ Justice and Witness Ministries
Heffa Schücking
Urgewald
Germany
Lukac Juraj, Jana Strnadova and Erik Balaz
WOLF Forest Protection Movement
Gimena Sanchez-Garzoli
Senior Associate for Colombia and Haiti
Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA)
Lee Dazey
Development Coordinator
Western Shoshone Defense Project
Edward Wemytewa
Tribal Council Member
Zuni Tribe (A:shiwi)
Slovakia
CC Attorney General (Fiscal)
British Foreign and Commonwealth Office, United Kingdom
Colombian Embassy, United Kingdom
Colombian Embassy, Washington DC
Inspector General (Procurador)
Interamerican Commission on Human Rights, Executive Secretary
Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development
Ministry of Culture
Ministry of Foreign Relations
Ministry of Mines and Energy
Ministry of National Defense
Ministry of the Environment, Livelihood, and Territorial Development
Ministry of the Interior and Justice
Ministry of the Interior and Justice, Department of Ethnic Affairs/ Indigenous Issues
Ombudsman (Defensoria del Pueblo)
President of Colombia, Human Rights Office
President of the Colombian Congress
President of the European Union
U.S. Embassy Bogota
United Nations High Commission for Human Rights in Colombia
USAID, Specialist on Displacement and Indigenous Issues
Vice-President of Colombia, Human Rights Office
Association of U’wa Traditional Authorities, ASO UWA