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Amazon Watch is deeply concerned about the escalating situation in Ecuador. In the context of a national strike led by the Indigenous movement, the Noboa administration’s push to expand oil development in the Amazon has raised serious alarms about judicial independence, civil liberties, and the protection of Indigenous rights.
These risks are unfolding as officials promote a new “Hydrocarbon Roadmap” opening nearly 30,000 km² of rainforest to drilling – much of it overlapping Indigenous territories that have not granted Free, Prior, and Informed Consent.
On September 25, seven Indigenous nations of the Ecuadorian Amazon – Kichwa, Waorani, Sápara, Shiwiar, Andwa, Shuar, Achuar – issued an international denunciation of the government’s oil expansion plans, rejecting new auctions in their territories and warning of attempts to weaken constitutional protections for consent. Their statement comes amid a state of emergency and nationwide mobilization opposing subsidy cuts, extractive expansion, and the rollback of rights.
This renewed national stand builds on a broader wave of Indigenous resistance across the region. Earlier this summer, a historic binational alliance from Ecuador and Peru – united to reject a proposed Petroperú-Petroecuador interconnection plan that would revive Ecuador’s long-contested Southern Oil Round. That alliance affirmed a clear principle: without Free, Prior, and Informed Consent, no cross-border oil scheme has social license.
“Ecuador’s new oil auction is a direct threat to our territories. After 60 years of extraction, we’ve seen only death and destruction, not development.” said Nadino Calapucha (Kichwa – PAKKIRU), who is in New York this week for Climate Week.
For decades, Indigenous opposition has made expansion in Ecuador’s southeastern Amazon a losing bet. Over more than 20 years, no new wells have been drilled there – a reality rooted in community resistance, legal action, and international solidarity. Those headwinds are only intensifying today.
Our End Amazon Crude campaign links the struggles of Indigenous nations in the Amazon with fenceline communities living beside refineries in the U.S., especially in California, a top importer of Ecuadorian crude. This summer’s California visit by Indigenous leaders spotlighted how demand in the Global North drives rights violations and contamination in the rainforest, and how communities at both ends of the supply chain are organizing for change.
Momentum is building. In August, the California State Senate unanimously passed SR 51, committing the state to examine its Amazon crude footprint and explore steps to phase it out – directly challenging the market pull that underwrites expansion plans in Ecuador. That signal lands at a moment when Ecuadorian officials are courting financiers in closed-door meetings during Climate Week in New York.
The picture is clear: inside Ecuador, seven nations have publicly denounced new auctions on their lands; across borders, and have joined forces with neighboring Peruvian indigenous nations on the other side of the border to oppose the Petroperú-Petroecuador linkage.
Internationally, allies are moving to curb demand. Together, these fronts add up to profound social, legal, environmental, and financial risks for any attempt to open new oil frontiers in one of the planet’s most critical forests.
As the Amazon nears a climate tipping point, the only responsible path is to respect Indigenous self-determination, uphold constitutional and international law, and keep Amazon oil in the ground.
Amazon Watch will continue to stand with our partners in Ecuador and across the Basin, and with communities in California, to End Amazon Crude and advance a just transition that protects life on both sides of the supply chain.
