Lima, Peru – Indigenous communities of the Peruvian Amazon expressed to the Argentine Pluspetrol company their decision to not allow the opening of new oil wells, given concerns over contamination of their territories, as stated today by the Federation of Native Communities of the Corrientes River Basin (Feconaco).
Leaders of the native communities of José Olaya, Nueva Jerusalén, Sauki and Antioquia, alongside Feconaco leadership, announced their decision to Pluspetrol Norte’s general manager, Roberto Ramallo, and top government officials during a meeting last august 20th.
“In this meeting we spoken clearly, but firmly about our right to health, food and life and the decision of our people to not allow the exploitation of new wells given the high levels of contamination which we are facing,” stated Tomas Maynas, leader of Nueva Jerusalén, during the aforementioned meeting.
Feconaco’s legal adviser, Lily La Torre, told Efe today that the meeting was “very important” because Pluspetrol affirmed the desire for a “peaceful relationship and good neighborliness with native communities,” and in that sense, there will be no new wells without indigenous consent.
Amazonian communities complain that Peru’s Ministry of Energy and Mines in 1997 approved the opening of new oil wells without consulting them, as is mandated by Peru’s indigenous peoples law, in force for the last fourteen years.
“Native communities do not want to prohibit, but rather avoid any harm to their territories,” stated La Torre, underscoring that the government has “the obligation to protect the rights of indigenous peoples.”
At the start of the month, native communities affected by the contamination brought on by oil activities in the Amazon demanded that the Peruvian government comply with a number of environmental and social agreements stipulated in the Dorissa Accord.
This agreement, signed in October 2006, commits the government, alongside the operating company Pluspetrol, to improve the living conditions of the affected inhabitants, and to begin to decontaminate the Corrientes river, located in the Amazonian district of Loreto.
The accord was signed after more than 300 native Achuars occupied many of the oil wells in Block 1AB and 8, protesting Pluspetrol’s alleged contamination of the Corrientes river, the river basin wherein the native communities live and where the presumed health damages to local inhabitants occur.
Peru’s human rights Ombudsman stated at the beginning of the month that there have been some advancements in meeting the Dorissa Accord. EFE
(Translated from Spanish original by Amazon Watch)
