“More than four months since a discerning opinion by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention that found Steven Donziger’s detention to be arbitrary, U.S. judicial authorities have thus far failed to take any action to remedy the situation and implement the Working Group’s call to ensure Mr. Donziger’s immediate release.”
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Bolsonaro Trying to Ram Through Mining Bill on False Pretenses; Canadian Mining Company to Profit.
Brazil’s President Bolsonaro is using a possible fertilizer shortage caused by Russia’s war on Ukraine to justify his attempt to ram contentious legislation through Congress.
Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher Exposed in New Report: How a Notorious Law Firm Enables Corporate Exploitation
A new report, "Unacceptable Shenanigans" - How Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher Enables Corporate Exploitation, endorsed by ten national and international organizations, exposes how the notorious Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher law firm abets human rights violations by multinational corporations the world over.
Citigroup “Climate Forward” Reputation Remains Tainted with Impacts of Fossil Fuel Financing in Amazon Rainforest
Report shows bank’s role in funding state-run oil companies with ties to corruption, rights violations, pollution, and deforestation in the Amazon. Indigenous leaders, human rights and environmental campaigners calling for Citi to exit Amazon oil and gas
Ahead of Citigroup Investor Day, environmental campaigners at Amazon Watch and Stand.earth are releasing a report spotlighting the bank’s exposure and central role in providing financing and investments of tens of billions to oil and gas companies in the Amazon.
BlackRock, Vanguard Among Financiers That Poured Billions into Companies Mining in Amazonian Indigenous Territories
New report by the Association of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil (APIB) and Amazon Watch reveals main investors of eight large mining companies notorious for human rights violations and environmental pollution, including Vale, Anglo American, and Belo Sun, wish to explore Indigenous territories in Brazil.
Brasília, Brazil – Today the Association of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil (APIB), alongside environmental and human rights organization Amazon Watch, launched Complicity in Destruction IV: How mining companies and international investors drive Indigenous rights violations and threaten the future of the Amazon.
Amazon Watch is building on more than 28 years of radical and effective solidarity with Indigenous peoples across the Amazon Basin.
The Science Based Targets Initiative's Proposed FLAG Targets are a Corporate Gift to Big Agribusiness
The inclusion of carbon offset schemes and carbon intensity-based targets for commodity producers poses grave threats to Indigenous rights, forest ecosystems, and the climate, groups warn
Oakland, CA – Today, Amazon Watch and allied organizations submitted their opposition to the Science Based Targets Initiative’s (SBTi) newly-proposed Forests, Land, and Agriculture (FLAG) emissions targets. The proposed FLAG targets are incompatible with the action necessary to address the climate crisis.
Amazon Watch Statement: Highest Ecuadorian Court Finds Decree 751 Unconstitutional, Would Have Allowed Oil Drilling in Area Protected for Isolated Peoples
Quito, Ecuador – In a reprieve for Indigenous peoples living in isolation inside of Ecuador’s Yasuní National Park, the country’s top court declared Decree 751 unconstitutional, permanently prohibiting drilling in the buffer zone.
Indigenous Communities Confront Ecuadorian Government and International Financiers at Oil and Energy Conference
Promises of environmental responsibility ring hollow as recent major spill turns rainforest and rivers black with crude
Quito, Ecuador – Today the leaders of Ecuador’s Indigenous movement and the regional pan-Amazon Indigenous organization mobilized outside Ecuador’s Annual Conference for Oil and Energy to demand justice for communities affected by the recent disastrous Amazon oil spill and to denounce plans for new drilling.
Citigroup Fails to Rein in Oil and Gas Expansion to Address Amazon Rainforest Crisis
Oakland, CA – Yesterday, finance giant Citigroup released an outline of its latest plans to achieve net zero in its energy and power portfolios. Despite these new commitments, Citi remains a major bankroller of oil and gas expansion in the Amazon biome – as it is the top financier of state-owned oil companies in the Amazon. This reality is...
Brazilian Government To Hand Over Public Lands to Canadian Company In Back Door Deal
Land reform agency has negotiated with Belo Sun Mining corp. to reduce a public land settlement to favor a gold mining project in the Amazon. Families in the area have not been consulted. Negotiations are “null and void,” says Public Defender.
Oakland, CA – The federal agency tasked with land reform policy in Brazil, INCRA, has reduced the area of a settlement created 22 years ago to make room for gold mining. The negotiation, settled with a contract signed recently with the Canadian company Belo Sun Mining Corp., was revealed last week.
New Investigation Reveals California Fueling Amazon Rainforest Oil Drilling and Destruction
COSTCO, American Airlines, Amazon.com, FedEx, and other major corporations revealed in chain of custody research
“Oil extraction in our Ecuadorian Amazon has brought pollution, diseases, deforestation, destruction of our cultures, and the colonization of our territories. It is an existential threat to us, and it violates our fundamental rights as Indigenous peoples."
Ecuador’s Constitutional Court to Issue New Ruling on FPIC
Ecuadorian government granted an environmental license in 2011 for San Carlos Panantza mining project without consultation and consent of the Shuar Arutam
“These cases are not isolated. There is not a single mining or oil project where these rights have been adequately complied with, so it is urgent that the Court rule in accordance with international human rights standards,” said Carlos Mazabanda, Amazon Watch Ecuador Field Coordinator.
Tlaib, Garcia Lead Letter Asking AG Garland, DOJ to Intervene in Donziger Case
Human rights lawyer and environmental activist jailed for taking on Big Oil polluter Chevron
“The Biden administration can’t claim to believe in the importance of climate action, much less climate justice, if it is unwilling to defend the rights of frontline communities and their advocates holding the fossil fuel industry accountable,” said Paul Paz y Miño, Associate Director at Amazon Watch.
Brazilian Police Attack Indigenous Community Trying to Halt Illegal Mining on their Territory
Yesterday, Brazilian Military Police, including a squad of elite special police known as the BOPE, violently attacked a surveillance post maintained by the Macuxi people in the Indigenous community of Tabatinga, on Raposa Serra do Sol Indigenous Territory, Roraima state. Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets at peacefully assembled community...
Brazilian Indigenous Leader Faces Renewed Attack Upon Returning from the COP26 Summit
Oakland, CA – Last Saturday, Brazilian Indigenous leader Alessandra Korap Munduruku had her house invaded in the Amazonian city of Santarém, days after returning from the COP26 summit in Glasgow.
COP26 Agreement Fails to Address Climate Emergency, Take Necessary Steps to Protect Amazon and Respect Indigenous Peoples’ Rights
Fossil fuel lobby outnumbered Indigenous representation two to one, nations struck deal on international carbon markets despite Indigenous opposition to carbon pricing
Glasgow, UK – Undermining global hopes for meaningful action, the 26th annual Conference of Parties (COP26) climate summit in Glasgow concluded over the weekend without successfully addressing key drivers of the climate crisis, among them the destruction of the Amazon rainforest and the role of fossil fuels.
COP26: Frontline Communities Confront JPMorgan Chase on Violating Indigenous Rights and Financing the Climate Crisis
Glasgow, Scotland – Indigenous land defenders gathered outside the JPMorgan Chase offices in Glasgow’s financial district today to demand the bank stop financing fossil fuel extraction.
Investigation Finds "Alternative Development" Program Ties to Land Theft, Coca Plantations in Peruvian Amazon
Counter-narcotics program supported by the U.S. Agency for International Development has contributed to land invasions, deforestation, and deadly social conflicts with Indigenous leaders
“The investigation clearly illustrates how Peruvian authorities violated Amazonian Indigenous peoples’ rights to their own territories, exposing them to land invasions, violence, and death."
Financial and Scientific Resources, Full Recognition and Respect of Indigenous Rights, Can Halt Further Degradation of the Amazon
RAISG study reveals that the region has 22% deforestation, reached the point of no return
Glasgow, UK – During climate talks at COP26 in Glasgow, experts and representatives of Indigenous nationalities shared their vision regarding what the strategies should be to stop the continuous degradation and deforestation of Amazonia, which have led the rainforest to a point of no return: 22% percent of the total area of the basin has been...
Indigenous Delegates at COP26 Endorse Campaign Demanding Banks Exit Amazon Oil and Gas
Dutch bank ING becomes latest to end oil financing in region, implement demands of Stand.earth, Amazon Watch’s new campaign
The role of European lenders in backing the trade from the Amazon came under scrutiny in August 2020 after a report by advocacy groups Stand.earth and Amazon Watch looking at oil exports from the region to the United States.
Breaking: Donziger’s Appeal Denied, Must Report to Prison Wednesday
Congress, international groups demand Chevron stop targeting activists and Attorney General Garland to release US human rights lawyer
New York, NY – After an unprecedented 800+ days of home detention, human rights attorney Steven Donziger, who helped win the historic $9.5 billion judgment against Chevron for deliberate pollution of the Ecuadorian Amazon for over two decades, was sentenced to six months in prison.
Statement on the State of Emergency Declared by Ecuador's President Lasso
“We denounce the Ecuadorian government’s use of this State of Emergency as a pretext to quell opposition to its proposed policy reforms and silence Indigenous, union, and workers’ rights to peacefully protest. Such militarization has a clear purpose – to restrict the right of freedom of association, expression, and peaceful protest – which can...
New Report: Chevron’s Global Record of Denial and Destruction
Chevron Violates Domestic and International Laws with Impunity Worldwide
Washington, DC – A new report entitled Chevron’s Global Destruction: Ecocide, Genocide, and Corruption was released today amid a firestorm of criticism directed toward the multinational corporation. The report’s author, Nan M. Greer, Ph.D., documents how Chevron, the world’s number one producer in greenhouse gas emissions among all investor-owned...
Environmental Justice and Human Rights Organizations: Carbon Offsets Don't Stop Climate Change
Over 170 organizations including Amazon Watch, Food & Water Watch, Indigenous Environmental Network, Sunrise Movement, Gulf Coast Center for Law and Poverty, Friends of the Earth, and more around the world, sign statement opposing carbon offsets
Oakland, CA – Today, a broad coalition of over 170 NGOs, advocacy groups, and grassroots organizations spanning the globe released a statement opposing the usage of carbon offset programs, declaring that carbon offset programs are false solutions that will not solve the climate crisis.
Statement: Offsets Don’t Stop Climate Change
We call on global policy makers to reject offset schemes and embrace real climate solutions that will keep fossil fuels in the ground, support sustainable food systems, and end deforestation, while eliminating pollution in frontline communities.
Human Rights Lawyer Steven Donziger Sentenced to Maximum, Six Months in Prison
New York, NY – Today, judge Loretta Preska sentenced Steven Donziger to the maximum sentence of six months in federal prison for the petty misdemeanor contempt of court charges filed by judge Lewis Kaplan, a pro-Chevron former tobacco industry lawyer. The charges were prosecuted by corporate law firm Seward & Kissel, appointed by Kaplan himself...
Depths of Fossil Fuel Industry's Power Over U.S. Government Exposed in Chevron/Donziger Case
Despite demands for his freedom and calls for investigations from the UN, Congress, and the International Community, Steven Donziger to be Sentenced for Criminal Contempt of Court
"We are alarmed by human rights lawyer Steve Donziger's sentencing today. While the severity of Donziger's fate may seem unprecedented, it is emblematic of the larger trend of silencing activists, many of whom are fighting for the solutions desperately needed to combat the global climate crisis exacerbated by multinational fossil fuel companies,"...
Ecuador Wages Legal Attack on Indigenous Plaintiffs Who Won $9.5 Billion-Dollar Legal Victory Against Chevron
Despite facing five decades of some of the world's worst oil-related contamination at the hands of Chevron and winning a historic 28-year legal battle that has yet to result in a clean up of its toxic legacy, Indigenous plaintiffs in the case are now under legal attack from its own government. In an effort to appease Chevron and court investors...
Flyovers Confirm Southern Amazonas Is New Deforestation Frontier in Brazilian Amazon
Images taken last week between Porto Velho, Rondônia and Lábrea, Amazonas show widespread devastation in one of the most conserved areas of the Amazon rainforest
"We saw all the stages of the deforestation process one after the other: The extraction of high-value timber, the burning of vegetation to grow pasture, and cattle herds occupying areas that until recently were covered by forest," says Rômulo Batista, spokesperson for the Greenpeace Brazil Amazon campaign.
