Trade and tariffs between the United States and Ecuador, site of the Chevron Ecuador trial, are discussed in this article:
Ecuadorian pineapple and mango exporters will now be exempt from U.S. tariffs after a decision to renew the Andean Trade Promotion and Drug Eradication Act (ATPDEA), website Telegrafo.com.ec reported.
Overview of a hearing on human rights in Washington, D.C. last week:
On Tuesday, Oct. 25, a group of journalists and organizations defending human rights appeared at a hearing before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), in Washington D.C., to present the problems that are affecting freedom of expression in Ecuador.
Concern about media censorship in Ecuador:
The columnist believed that the decision was based on the owners’ fear of legal reprisals similar to those faced by the newspaper El Universo, whose owners were sentenced to three years in prison and to pay damages amounting to $40 million after publishing an opinion piece critical of President Rafael Correa.
Ecuador finds itself ranked 83 out of 187 in terms of development compared to other countries:
The UN Development Fund (UNDF) placed Ecuador in the high category within the measurement of human development, the highest index for the country, used annually by this body since 1998.
News about Petroecuador, the state owned oil company which has accepted 100 percent responsibility for all oil operations in the former consortium managed area, now the subject of the Chevron Ecuador trial:
Ecuadorian state oil company Petroecuador and Venezuelan counterpart PDVSA have signed a new contract for the joint development of a field in Ecuador’s Amazon region despite non-compliance with investment commitments under the previous deal.
Reuters updates its profile of current events in Ecuador, including a brief overview of developments in the Chevron Ecuador trial:
The appointment of a new cabinet, tensions between government and media, and contract talks with mining companies are issues to watch in Ecuador.
News about Petroecuador, the state owned oil company which has accepted 100 percent responsibility for all oil operations in the former consortium managed area, now the subject of the Chevron Ecuador trial:
Ecuador’s state oil company Petroecuador and its Venezuelan counterpart PDVSA agreed on Tuesday to invest some $1.27 billion to boost output at the onshore Sacha field, the largest in Ecuador, officials said according to reports.
More on the case in the country where the Chevron Ecuador trial has taken place…the owners and former editor of the country’s largest newspaper were initially sentenced to three years in prison and ordered to pay $40 million in fines for libel against President Rafael Correa:
The Human Rights Foundation (HRF) sent a letter today to the magistrates of the National Court of Justice of Ecuador (NCJE), exhorting them to overturn the verdict that sentenced journalist Emilio Palacio and three executives of El Universo newspaper to three years in prison and ordered them to pay USD 40 million in damages to Rafael Correa, the president of Ecuador. HRF’s letter to the magistrates was accompanied by a legal report that analyzes Palacio’s case under international human rights law.
Ecuador president, Rafael Correa, threatens to nationalize fruit exporters that don’t fall in line with his policy:
Ecuador’s president, Rafael Correa, has threatened to nationalise Ecuadorian banana exporters that acquire fruit outside the official framework and fail to comply with the country’s official price.
At the site of the Chevron Ecuador trial we see:
Ecuador exported 8.63 million barrels of crude oil in December 2011, up 17% from 7.38 million barrels a month earlier, the Central Bank said.
All the oil was exported by Ecuador’s state-owned companies.
Revenue from Ecuador’s crude oil exports totaled $909 million in December, up 10% from $826 million the month before.
Another newspaper weighs in on freedom of speech issues in Ecuador, site of the Chevron Ecuador trial. The New York Times and The Washington Post also editorialized in recent weeks against President Rafael Correa’s actions:
An attack on freedom of the press anywhere is an attack on freedom everywhere.
Such an assault is under way in Ecuador, a nation ruled with a heavy hand by a lightweight dictator who seems to wish he were Hugo Chavez of Venezuela.
The target: El Universo, a 90-year-old Guayaquil newspaper, one of the largest in Latin America and a leading voice for freedom and democracy in the region.
Government of Ecuador and Petroecuador, the country’s state owned and run oil company, sign agreement to increase oil output in the country where the Chevron Ecuador trial has taken place:
President Rafael Correa presided over the ceremony, in which Petroecuador head Marco Calvopiña and the representatives of the two winning consortiums inked the deals.
Ecuador state-run oil company Petroecuador late Tuesday signed 15-year contracts with both consortia, which will invest about $1.7 billion over the next five years.
“We condemn the latest reforms to Ecuador’s electoral law, which are so broad that they could, among other things, effectively prevent reporting on election matters for three months prior to the vote,” said Carlos Lauría, CPJ’s senior Americas program coordinator. “This deprives citizens of their right to stay informed on election news and represents the latest step in the deterioration of press freedom under Correa.”
Ecuador’s energy minister says U.S. and Argentine companies are investing nearly $1.7 billion to boost production in the country’s two main oil fields by 40,000 barrels a day.
The Lago Agrio judgment was procured through a corrupt and fraudulent scheme, much of which was captured on film and memorialized in the plaintiffs’ representatives’ own emails and correspondence. Their misconduct includes fabricating expert reports, manufacturing evidence, bribing and colluding with court officials, waging a campaign of intimidation against judges, and even ghostwriting parts of the verdict itself. Evidence of these crimes has been provided to Ecuador’s courts and prosecutors, but authorities there have taken no corrective actions.
Any uncertainty caused about potential liabilities regarding the recent Brazilian oil spill and Ecuador court cases is overdone.
Organizations like the Inter American Press Association, the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers and Reporters Without Borders have asked President Correa to stop his assault on journalists and the media, like that facing the newspaper El Universo, which could set a dangerous precedent. Publications like The New York Times, Washington Post, Spain’s El País, El Espectador in Colombia, and La Nación in Argentina have also questioned Correa’s actions. Even Ecuador’s previous presidents have asked that Correa respect freedom of expression.
President Rafael Correa of Ecuador is leading a relentless campaign against free speech, harassing his critics, forcing independent broadcasters off the air and hijacking the nation’s courts in his bid to bankrupt the country’s largest newspaper.
Reporters are frequently assassinated in Mexico, and a populist government in Venezuela has driven some journalists into exile. But press freedom advocates say that no other country in Latin America is moving so fast and on so many fronts to restrain the media as tiny, banana-producing Ecuador.
President Rafael Correa, an American-educated leftist economist who has forged close alliances with Cuba and Iran, has filed a defamation lawsuit that might put the three directors of the country’s largest newspaper in jail and shutter their 90-year-old paper. The government has cobbled together a framework of laws and constitutional reforms to limit press independence, free expression groups say, while building a media conglomerate to disparage critics and counter independent media reports.
The appeal, read Chevron’s announcement, “establishes that the lower courts violated the Ecuadorian constitution by refusing to take any corrective action in response to the extensive fraud and corruption committed by plaintiffs lawyers and their representatives.”
Fadel Gheit, an analyst with Oppenheimer who follows the company, agrees.
“If I was ruling Chevron, I would fight until the very last minute of my job, and make sure the next guy behind me will not pay them anything,” Gheit said. “They are a bunch of scam artists.”
Gheit said Chevron has no choice but to fight the lawsuit to the end, because paying would set a precedent that other people across the globe could try exploiting.
Since taking office in 2007, Ecuador’s President Rafael Correa has been in a war of words with the media in his country. He’s used archaic libel laws to pursue criminal charges against the owners of El Universo and a columnist at the newspaper. His government has pushed through a law that severely restricts the media’s ability to cover political campaigns and elections; indeed, it goes so far as to ban any media reports that can benefit or hurt a candidate. And now he’s set his sights on international media observers.
U.S. oil giant Chevron Corp. said it would pursue another appeal of a multibillion dollar judgment against in Ecuador for environmental contamination.
The company said it has submitted a petition to have a review performed by Ecuador’s National Court of Justice, The Wall Street Journal reported Saturday.
