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    Yasuni

    Protests Grow as Ecuador's Amazon Oil Auction Closes

    Indigenous leaders and allies mobilize in Quito to contest final 11th Round bids

    Quito, Ecuador – Protesters gathered outside the Oil and Energy Conference at the Marriott Hotel in Quito yesterday where meetings took place in a final push by the Ecuadorian government to auction off 13 oil blocks that are part of the 11th Round of oil-licensing covering over six million acres of rainforest in the Amazon.

    November 27, 2013
    5,324 views
    4 min read

    Patricia Gualinga: Warrior for the Amazon

    For years, Kichwa leader Patricia Gualinga has been on the front lines of Sarayaku's struggle, a key protagonist in their recent historic victory and an incredible leader of a rapidly-growing movement of women defending the Amazon.

    November 20, 2013
    6,704 views
    2 min read

    Stunning Aerial Photos Reveal Ecuador Building Roads Deeper into Yasuní Rainforest

    Petroamazonas appears to be building destructive access roads deeper into Yasuní National Park

    Mongabay.com | Photographers Ivan Kashinsky and Karla Gachet were on assignment in Yasuní National Park, home to arguably the most biodiverse rainforest in the world. While there, they happened to take an aerial shoot above a controversial oil concession located in the heart of the park at the precise moment that the national oil company was secretly building a...

    November 12, 2013
    3,972 views
    3 min read

    Death in the Amazon

    The Economist | The massacre is blamed on pressure mounting on hidden peoples, who appear to have formed four distinct groups in the greater area of the Yasuní National Park, the northern half and western flanks of which have been open to oil production. The populist administration of president Rafael Correa, short of cash, wants to open the whole of the...

    November 8, 2013
    5,147 views
    4 min read

    Indigenous Leaders Say: Consultation Is Not "Nonsense"

    Last week a delegation of indigenous leaders traveled from the Ecuadorian Amazon to the IACHR in Washington, DC to help advise the Ecuadorian government on consultation with indigenous peoples.

    November 7, 2013
    5,456 views
    3 min read

    Amazon Watch is building on more than three decades of radical and effective solidarity with Indigenous peoples across the Amazon Basin.

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    Amazonian Indigenous Women Mobilize for Life

    "We've mobilized because we're worried about oil exploration plans, the 11th Round in particular, which affects all of the Amazon. We are here for our lives, yours, the entire world's lives and for those of our future generations."

    October 25, 2013
    3,537 views
    4 min read

    Join Us at Bioneers This Weekend!

    If you're going o the 24th Annual Bioneers Conference this weekend, be sure to catch up with Amazon Watch and our partners! We'll be speaking on the Main Stage, on panels, and we'll have a lively and informative booth outside.

    October 17, 2013
    6,237 views
    3 min read

    Why Ecuador's President Is Misleading the World on Yasuni-ITT

    Rafael Correa has moved to abolish an historic Amazon oil plan, but don't be fooled by what he claims

    The Guardian | The decision by Ecuador's president Rafael Correa to abandon a plan to permanently forgo exploiting hundreds of millions of barrels of oil has sparked severe non-state media criticism in Ecuador, calls for a referendum, protests in numerous cities and embassies around the world, and an international outcry.

    October 15, 2013
    1,807 views
    7 min read

    Ecuador's Parliament Gives the Green Light to Oil Drilling in Yasuni

    MPs authorise drilling in Amazon rainforest after failure of Rafael Correa's plan to persuade rich nations to protect it

    Reuters | Ecuador's parliament has authorised drilling of the nation's largest oilfields in part of the Amazon rainforest after the failure of President Rafael Correa's plan to have rich nations pay to avoid its exploitation. Correa launched the initiative in 2007 to protect the Yasuni jungle area, which boasts some of the planet's most diverse wildlife...

    October 4, 2013
    1,390 views
    2 min read

    The Battle over Ecuador’s Oil Takes New Twist

    China Dialogue | "The industrialised world isn't blameless, but most blame goes to Correa," says Amazon Watch's Adam Zuckerman. "It was difficult to sell the initiative if you're drilling right up to ITT, and he's been talking about 'Plan B' pretty constantly over the last year."

    October 4, 2013
    1,990 views
    6 min read

    Science Warns Against Drilling in Yasuní National Park

    National Geographic | The Ecuadorian government is currently racing ahead with plans to drill for oil in the core of what is arguably the most biodiverse corner of the planet. In response, a group of more than 100 scientists from Ecuador and 18 other countries around the world submitted a statement to the Ecuadorian Congress detailing the extraordinary biodiversity of...

    October 1, 2013
    3,006 views
    2 min read

    Amazon Watched! Our Annual Event Was a Big Success

    This Wednesday Amazon Watch held its 8th Annual Luncheon in San Francisco with a packed house. Many thanks to the hundreds of friends who came to join us in person and even more who tuned in to lend their support online.

    September 27, 2013
    2,808 views
    3 min read

    Over 130 Renowned Scholars Call on President Correa to Defend Yasuní-ITT

    Signatories include Vandana Shiva, Naomi Klein and James Hansen

    Quito, Ecuador – More than 130 renowned academics and intellectuals from all over the world sent a letter to Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa. Scholars including Vandana Shiva, James Hansen, Naomi Klein, Boaventura de Souza Santos, Arturo Escobar, and Timothy Mitchell, among others, headed up the letter.

    September 19, 2013
    4,519 views
    2 min read

    Amazon in Focus 2013

    Plus Our Annual Financial Report for 2012

    2013 follows a remarkable year for Amazon Watch and our partners in 2012: Talisman Energy and Conoco Phillips announced they would cease oil operations and leave the Peruvian Amazon; Belo Monte dam construction was significantly delayed in Brazil; and we celebrated the landmark decision of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) in favor...

    Fall 2013
    1,876 views
    1 min read

    Vigil to Preserve Yasuní-ITT

    The vast majority of Ecuadorians want to preserve Yasuní-ITT, and many of them held a vigil in front of the Presidential Palace to show their support for the plan.

    August 23, 2013
    1,013 views
    1 min read

    Race to Save Ecuador's Yasuní National Park from Oil Lobby

    Green groups campaign for a petition to force a national referendum to block president's unilateral sanction for drilling

    The Guardian | The fate of one of the hotspots of global diversity is hanging by a thread as conservation and indigenous groups in Ecuador race to raise a petition of over half a million names which would force a national referendum on whether foreign oil companies be allowed into the Yasuní national park.

    August 23, 2013
    5,215 views
    5 min read

    Ecuador Stops Protecting Its Rainforest – to Pay Off Debt to China

    President Rafael Correa's decision reflects just how reliant his country is on Beijing as a source of loans

    The Atlantic | When a poor nation finds a massive oil reserve beneath a rainforest with more species per hectare than in all of North America, it makes for a nettlesome problem. When you add in a huge amount of debt to resource-hungry China, it makes for an environmental catastrophe.

    August 20, 2013
    2,839 views
    3 min read

    Ecuador Says It Will Launch Controversial Drilling in Amazon Park

    Science Magazine | Researchers consider the nearly 10,000 square kilometers of land within Ecuador’s Yasuni National Park to be one of the world’s richest biological hotspots. Yasuni is also the territory of the Waorani indigenous people and two nomadic Waorani clans who live in voluntary isolation.

    August 19, 2013
    1,794 views
    3 min read

    Ecuador Scraps Plan to Block Rain Forest Oil Drilling

    Idea had been hailed as a revolutionary way to combat climate change.

    National Geographic | The decision by Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa to abandon a plan to spare the species-rich Yasuní rain forest in eastern Ecuador from oil development has dashed hopes for what environmentalists had hailed as a historic approach to weaning industrial society from its dependence on fossil fuels.

    August 19, 2013
    1,655 views
    4 min read

    Plan to Ban Oil Drilling in Amazon Is Dropped

    New York Times | "It could have been used as a model for other sensitive areas," said Matt Finer, a scientist with the Center for International Environmental Law, referring to the fund. "But now that it has failed, there is really no alternative model that is attractive to governments unable or unwilling to forgo drilling solely on ecological grounds."

    August 17, 2013
    5,716 views
    3 min read

    Ecuador President Pulls Plug on Innovative Yasuni-ITT Initiative

    Indigenous groups and civil society vow resistance

    Quito, Ecuador – In an evening address to the nation on Thursday, Ecuador's President Rafael Correa officially terminated the historic Yasuni-ITT proposal, and announced that PetroAmazonas, the state run oil company, would initiate plans to exploit the Ishpingo, Tambococha, and Tiputini oil fields that lie beneath the eastern part of Yasuni...

    August 16, 2013
    3,261 views
    4 min read

    Ecuador Approves Yasuni National Park Oil Drilling in Amazon Rainforest

    Environmentalists devastated as president blames lack of foreign support for collapse of pioneering conservation plan

    The Guardian | President Correa said it would affect less that 1% of the park, but the termination of the conservation initiative has stirred up fury among environmentalists and is likely to upset the population at large. Polls show that between 78% and 90% of Ecuadoreans are opposed to drilling in this sensitive region.

    August 16, 2013
    6,262 views
    4 min read

    Ecuador Forced to Delay Oil Round; Now Let's Make Them Cancel It!

    This is the second time that the government has been forced to extend the deadline for bids, and is just the latest in a series of serious setbacks to the government's attempts to auction off millions of acres of the Amazon.

    July 22, 2013
    5,568 views
    2 min read

    Ecuador Pushes Bid Deadline for 11th Oil-Licensing Round to Nov. 28

    The Wall Street Journal | Quito, Ecuador – Ecuador has extended for the second time the deadline to submit offers for companies interested in the country's 11th oil-licensing round to explore for oil in blocks located in the southeastern Amazon region.

    July 16, 2013
    4,160 views
    2 min read

    Indigenous Protests Grow as Ecuador Closes Bidding on Amazonian Oil Round

    Leaders gather in Puyo to denounce auction of their territory

    Amazonian indigenous leaders mobilized today in the regional capital of Puyo to oppose the Ecuadorian government's attempts to close bids on eight million acres of its pristine southeastern Amazon. The region is Ecuador's last remaining tract of virgin rainforest and is home to seven indigenous nationalities. Attempts to lease it have been plagued...

    July 16, 2013
    5,882 views
    4 min read

    Investors Balking on Ecuador's Amazonian Oil Auction

    Last month President Correa apologized for an oil spill that wreaked havoc throughout the Amazon Basin. What the media narrative has largely missed is that there is an oil spill nearly every week in Ecuador.

    July 2, 2013
    1,553 views
    5 min read