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What does the Escazu Agreement mean for environmental defenders opposing fracking in Colombia?

By
Brent Patterson
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Click here to join Oscar Sampayo of the Alliance for a Colombia Free of Fracking on a webinar on Thursday April 29 that will discuss the implications of the Escazu Agreement for environmental defenders opposing fracking in Colombia.

The Escazu Agreement comes into force today, April 22.

It has been signed by 24 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean and formally ratified by 12 of those countries.

Reuters reports: “The treaty obligates countries to ensure activists can access public information on environmental cases and issues.”

It also notes: “The treaty orders countries to set up bodies to monitor, report and ensure new rules are adhered to, and specifies the rights of environmentalists, including their right to freedom of expression, free movement and peaceful assembly.”

Escazu in Colombia

Bogota-based journalist Genevieve Glatsky has written: “In Colombia, massive protests against President Iván Duque prompted the conservative leader to sign the agreement in December 2019, becoming the last country to join Escazú. But both houses of Congress must now approve it, before it then faces a Constitutional Court review, a process that has been delayed by the pandemic.”

Yesterday, Infobae reported: “On November 5, 2020, after a week in which pressure from environmental and political sectors related to the Escazu Agreement influenced public opinion to draw the Government’s attention to the management of the initiative awaiting formality in Congress, the Chancellery and the Ministry of Environment gave the green light to discussions in the second committee to ratify one of the most relevant articulations for environmental protection in America.”

Infobae comments: “This means that, in this way, the agreement enters into force, in Colombia there will be no commitment to guarantee compliance with what has been agreed.”

Canada and fracking in Colombia

The ExxonMobil Platero fracking pilot project in the Magdalena Medio region is situated on the VMM-37 block. Toronto-based Sintana Energy holds a 30 per cent interest in that block and welcomed the news of the Platero project.

Yesterday, Calgary-based Canacol Energy Ltd. announced that it is exploring the potential to frack on the VMM-2 and VMM-3 blocks in the Magdalena Medio region that it holds with ConocoPhillips. The CEO of Canacol has also welcomed the news of the approval of the Platero and Ecopetrol Kale fracking pilot projects. 

Webinar on April 29

Meanwhile, environmental defenders continue to experience death threats and danger in the Magdalena Medio region of Colombia.

On Thursday April 29, you can hear directly from four Colombian environmental defenders about the Escazu Agreement, the fracking pilot projects, and the international solidarity that is required to provide the guarantees needed for their safety.

To join us, register here.

At least three of the speakers on this webinar can be seen in this photo from this news clip.

Calgary-based Canacol Energy explores the potential for fracking in the Magdalena Medio region of Colombia

By
Brent Patterson
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Blockade of the ConocoPhillips/Canacol Energy VMM-2 block in September 2016. Click here to register for a webinar on Thursday April 29 at 2:30 pm COT/3:30 pm EDT with Colombian environmental defenders opposed to fracking.

On April 21, Valora Analitik reported: “Canacol Energy announced today the first results of an independent prospective evaluation of resources in the VMM 2 and VMM 3 blocks prepared by [Calgary-based] Boury Global Energy Consultants (BGEC) in the Magdalena Medio basin, one of the main areas identified to develop fracking pilots in Colombia.”

Canacol CEO Charle Gamba says: “BGEC’s independent assessment of the prospective unconventional resources reaffirms the materiality and significant potential of Canacol’s unconventional shale oil blocks.”

Gamba further says that he sees the approval of the ExxonMobil Platero and Ecopetrol Kale fracking pilot projects “to be positive steps towards realizing the commercial potential of the unconventional shale oil field in Colombia and specifically for the resources prospects that we have through our position in the Middle Magdalena Valley basin.”

Canacol holds a 20 per cent stake in the VMM-2/Plata and VMM-3/Piranga projects. ConocoPhillips holds the remaining 80 per cent stake.

In September 2020, Gamba told La Republica: “We have two unconventional oil blocks that we have located in Magdalena Medio for eight years to pilot fracking. We are awaiting the regulatory framework.”

Canacol had previously attempted to frack the Plata and Piranga sites in 2016. An estimated 9,000 people marched in San Martin, Cesar in opposition to this. There was even a community blockade of their exploration site. Residents reportedly faced stigmatization, police brutality and criminalization. Those permits were eventually revoked because Piranga did not meet minimum conditions and Plata raised water protection concerns.

April 29 webinar with Colombian opponents of fracking

As this Canadian company explores the potential for fracking, environmental defenders continue to be threatened in the Magdalena Medio region of Colombia. On Thursday April 29, our webinar will feature these four Colombian environmental defenders: Ivan Madero, Oscar Sampayo, Yuvelis Natalia Morales and Yuli Velasquez.

Click here to register for this fully bilingual webinar.

PBI-Honduras article points to the displacement that occurs due to extractivism and tourism

By
Brent Patterson
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The most recent Peace Brigades International-Honduras Project newsletter notes: “Over the past forty years, the number of Hondurans who migrate to the United States has increased by 3,000%. Studies note that we are facing a cycle of migration under a context of neoliberalism in its extractive phase. The consequences of tourist projects in Garífuna communities are particularly concerning.”

That paragraph in the newsletter then links to the PBI-Honduras article: “We do not want to be part of the caravans”.

That article notes: “In the Garífuna community of Barra Vieja (Atlántida Department) in 2014, the National Police and Military attempted to expel the inhabitants to move ahead with the construction of the Indura Resort tourist project.”

While Canadians may be aware of Canadian mining companies in Honduras, there may be less familiarity with Canadian real estate development there.

In December 2014, journalist Sandra Cuffe reported: “As Canadian investors gradually take over lands in Honduras’ Trujillo Bay for tourism and real estate projects, Afro-Indigenous Garifuna communities along this stretch of Caribbean coastline are being displaced.”

Trujillo is located on the coast about 280 kilometres east of the Garifuna community of Barra Vieja noted in the PBI-Honduras article. Trujillo is about 260 kilometres east of the community of Triunfo de la Cruz where PBI-Honduras notes in this Facebook post five young men (four of them Garifuna) were disappeared nine months ago.

Cuffe highlights: “Rio Negro, a Garifuna community, was largely displaced under threat of forced expropriation to make way for [a new cruise ship port in Trujillo].”

“Sixteen kilometres to the west, the Garifuna community of Guadalupe is now bordered by Alta Vista, one of Canadian investor Randy Jorgensen’s several residential development projects marketed to Canadian snowbirds.”

She adds: “Other Canadian developers have since followed, but Jorgensen remains the main player in the area.”

The article also quotes Jorgensen who says: “We sold 500 properties to Canadians. They’re starting to call it Little Canada.”

While Cuffe’s article was written almost seven years ago, Trujillo Vista, posted this video just two years ago. It highlights: “We are a Canadian real estate development firm selling a beach side project in Trujillo Honduras.”

The website of the North York, Ontario-based company notes: “Trujillo, Honduras is an up and coming marketplace on the verge of becoming the next Caribbean Hot Spot. It is slated for major development including a much larger cruise ship port.”

That website also describes Alta Vista (the same name as Jorgensen’s development) as “a private gated community landscaped with the lush flora and fauna of Honduras, that offers both beach side as well as ocean view properties for sale.”

With some of this additional context in mind, we encourage you to read the PBI-Honduras article “We do not want to be part of the caravans”.

PBI-Mexico accompanied FPDTAMPT announces resistance actions, solidarity with sit-in at Danone/Bonafont bottled water plant

By
Brent Patterson
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On April 21, PBI-Mexico tweeted: “Defenders of water and the environment of the @fpdtampt [Peoples’ Front in Defence of Land and Water] announce resistance actions in a context of continuous harassment and threats for their opposition to the PIM.”

PIM refers to the Morelos Integral Project which consists of an aqueduct that would take 50 million litres of water a day from the Cuautla River, a 171-kilometre gas pipeline that crosses three states, and a thermoelectric plant in Huexca, Morelos.

The Peoples’ Front note that they are considering “a sit-in in front of the thermoelectric plant” and starting “a travelling dissemination camp.”

On Facebook, the Peoples’ Front adds about its planned dissemination camp: “Alongside the truths of thermoelectric, we will take every town and place to invite us and spread: the word, memory and demand for justice for our brother Samir.”

Samir Flores, an Indigenous rights defender, member of the FPDTA and opponent of the PIM, was shot to death on February 20, 2019.

The Peoples’ Front has also denounced the harassment of the sit-in at the Bonafont company headquarters in San Mateo Cuanalá, Puebla.

The French transnational Danone has owned the bottled water company Bonafont since 1996.

Last month, La Jornada reported: “Dozens of residents gathered at the company headquarters, with banners in hand to demand the closure of the company, as they reported that it extracts the liquid from deep wells and leaves the inhabitants without supply.”

Another report by La Jornada has noted: “For 25 years, the Bonafont company has irregularly exploited more than 1,400,000 liters of water daily from the Iztaccíhuatl volcano veins, workers from the French company that belongs to the Danone Group.”

That article highlights: “The sit-in is held by a hundred residents, 60 percent made up of women and their children, who in the evening receive the support of those who return from work in the city of Puebla to gather up to 300 people.”

In Canada, Danone sells a wide variety of dairy and non-dairy products.

PBI-Mexico has accompanied the FPDTAMPT since early 2020.

PBI-Honduras observes constitutional challenge against Legislative Decree on virtual lobbying given limits on Internet access

By
Brent Patterson
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On April 21, PBI-Honduras posted on Facebook: “Yesterday we observed the presentation of an action of unconstitutionality against Legislative Decree 154-2020, which provides for the suspension of the open face-to-face meetings established by the Municipalities Law, becoming made virtually.”

PBI-Honduras comments: “This harms due process because only the population that has the economic conditions of access to equipment and the internet will be able to exercise their right to political participation.”

Criterio.hn further reports: “Honduran social organizations presented an action of unconstitutionality against Legislative Decree 154-2020, which suspends open face-to-face lobbying and enables the realization of these in a virtual way, restricting and discriminating political participation in a country where only 31.7% of the population has access to the internet.”

“The action was presented by the Coalition Against Impunity (ICC) composed of 53 civil society organizations together with Cristosal, the Black Fraternal Organization of Honduras (OFRANEH), the Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH), the Law Firm for Peoples and the Municipal Committee for the Defense of Common and Public Goods.”

That article also notes: “The organizations involved argue that this action against face-to-face participation in open lobbying is extremely serious, because these spaces are the only mechanism of participation to implement the rights of access to information and direct political participation in the face of the operations of megaprojects and extractivist projects that are installed in rural municipalities of the country.”

In August 2020, Criterio.hn also reported: “While indigenous and Afro-descendant groups remain in confinement, extractive projects continue to operate with carte blanche from the State, as stated in the report ‘Abandonment has a face and consequences’ presented by the Social Forum of External Debt and Development of Honduras (Fosdeh) and Oxfam.”

PBI-Canada shares the concerns expressed by PBI-Honduras.

Budget 2021 reaffirms $553 billion for the Canadian military, while $18 billion in annual fossil fuel subsidies remain unlisted

By
Brent Patterson
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The founding statement of Peace Brigades International from September 1981 says: “We appeal in particular to all those who seek to fulfill the high principles and purposes expressed in the Charter of the United Nations.”

The Charter includes the vision of “the least diversion for armaments of the world’s human and economic resources.”

It is through that lens that we evaluate Budget 2021 tabled by Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland in the House of Commons on April 19.

Chapter 9 of the budget includes the line: “Canada’s 2017 defence policy, Strong, Secure, Engaged, set out a vision for a long-term, fully-funded plan to renew and re-equip the Canadian military, built around people.”

The budget text doesn’t give a figure for Strong, Secure, Engage, so one has to go to that document to find that it is $553 billion on a cash basis over 20 years.

It further specifies: “To meet Canada’s defence needs at home and abroad, the Government will grow annual defence spending over the next 10 years from $17.1 billion in 2016-17 to $24.6 billion in 2026-27 on an accrual basis. This translates to a rise in annual defence spending on a cash basis from $18.9 billion in 2016-17 to $32.7 billion in 2026-27.”

And along with new expenditures for the NATO and NORAD military alliances, “Budget 2021 proposes to provide $541.2 million over five years, starting in 2021-22, to the Department of National Defence to maintain an additional six fighter aircraft and a frigate as part of the NATO Readiness Initiative.”

The Canadian government has already committed $15-19 billion to buying 88 new fighter aircraft that this analysis says will cost $76.8 billion over 20 years.

Excessive militarization and climate change

Michelle Bachelet, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, has warned that the climate crisis is greatest ever threat to human rights.

Izumi Nakamitsu, the United Nations High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, has also commented: “We must consider alternatives to excessive militarization and seek options that address the real challenges of our time, including climate change, epidemics and pandemics, mass refugee flows and extreme poverty.”

On the point of climate change, Chapter 5 of the budget notes: “Budget 2021 proposes to provide $17.6 billion towards a green recovery to create jobs, build a clean economy, and fight and protect against climate change.”

However, Budget 2021 still does not tabulate the amount that the federal government provides in fossil fuel subsidies.

CBC has reported: “In 2019, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau wrote in his mandate letter to then-finance minister Bill Morneau that he was expected to finalize a report listing Canada’s fossil fuel financial supports. That report remains a work in progress, according to what MPs on the natural resources parliamentary committee were told in March.”

That said, the Canadian advocacy organization Environmental Defence recently released this report that documented: “In 2020, the federal government either announced or provided a minimum of nearly $18 billion to the oil and gas sector.”

Within the tabulation of costs, Environmental Defence noted: “A particularly egregious form of fossil fuel subsidy are investments made into policing Indigenous land defenders opposing fossil fuel infrastructure.”

They then highlight: “For example, over $13 million was spent last year on the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to ‘protect’ the Coastal GasLink pipeline – which took the form of harassing Wet’suwet’en Nation community members who oppose the pipeline.”

Next steps

The first of four days of debate on the budget began on Tuesday April 20. The fourth day of debate is expected next week and there will eventually be a vote on a budget implementation bill in the coming weeks.

PBI-Canada continues to promote expenditures that build peace and genuine security, promote human rights, and address the underlying issues of militarism.

PBI-Colombia accompanies COSPACC and CSPP at ‘The right to defend rights’ workshop in Casanare

By
Brent Patterson
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On April 19, PBI-Colombia posted on Instagram: “This weekend PBI we accompanied the Social Corporation for Community Counseling and Training (COSPACC) and the Committee for Solidarity with Political Prisoners (CSPP) in the workshop ‘The right to defend rights’ given to defenders and leaders in Plan Brisas, Casanare.”

COSPACC and the CSPP have also produced the report Criminalization of the defence of human rights in Colombia: The judicialization of defenders of land, territory, environment and peace. It documents that 74 per cent of the human rights defenders prosecuted between January 2012 and July 2019 were environmental defenders.

That report also highlights the case of the eight social leaders in San Luis de Palenque, Casanare criminalized by Toronto-based Frontera Energy.

Michel Forst explains: “Social protests [took place] between 2016 and 2018 in response to the failure of Canadian public company Frontera Energy to fulfil its obligation to compensate communities affected by environmental damage and to repair damaged roads.”

Frontera then signed two protection agreements on November 16 and 19, 2018 with the Colombian Ministry of Defence totalling US$1.3 million.

Days later, on November 27, 2018, the army and police launched a massive operation and arrested eight social leaders.

It wasn’t until August 10, 2020, that a court revoked the custodial measures imposed on two of these social leaders. Then on September 16, 2020, after more than 500 days having elapsed without a trial, a judge ordered the release of the other leaders.

We continue to closely follow this case.

We were also honoured to have COSPACC lawyer Tatiana Triana speak on our webinar on International Women Human Rights Defenders Day on November 29 last year.

PBI-Colombia has accompanied COSPACC since 2009 and the CSPP since 1998.

Colombian environmental defenders reject fracking at decentralized session of Departmental Assembly of Santander in Puerto Wilches

By
Brent Patterson
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On April 20, these Colombian environmental defenders were at the decentralized session of the Departmental Assembly of Santander in Puerto Wilches in opposition to the fracking pilot projects that have been authorized in the Magdalena Medio region.

They are Ivan Madero (CREDHOS), Oscar Sampayo (CRY-GEAM), Yuvelis Natalia Morales (AguaWil) and Yuli Velasquez (FEDEPESAN).

To hear about what they said, please join us on Thursday April 29 at 2:30 pm COT/3:30 pm EDT for a bilingual webinar featuring all four of them.

You can do so by registering here.

The National Hydrocarbons Agency (ANH) has issued contracts to Ecopetrol and ExxonMobil to conduct fracking pilot projects near Puerto Wilches, Santander in the Magdalena Medio region despite public opposition and human rights concerns.

At the decentralized session, the Departmental Assembly of Santander called on the National Government to “[suspend] the realization of [the fracking pilot projects] in our territory and [avoid] the possibility of exploiting unconventional deposits and implementing the fracking technique in our department.”

Furthermore, the Alliance for a Colombia Free of Fracking note: “Delegates from the Governorate of Santander expressed the resounding rejection of Governor Mauricio Aguilar and the departmental administration of fracking projects in the department.”

On that point, the Alliance tweeted: “We hope that announcements made today by [the Government of Santander Interior Secretary Camilo Arenas] in Puerto Wilches are translated into real and concrete actions by [the Governor of Santander Mauricio Aguilar Hurtado] to oppose the fracking pilots in the department of Santander.”

To hear an update on what “concrete actions” may have been taken in the nine days after the decentralized session, join those who were there for this webinar on April 29.

Ivan Madero (CREDHOS), Oscar Sampayo (CRY-GEAM), Yuvelis Natalia Morales (AguaWil) and Yuli Velasquez (FEDEPESAN)

Mary Robinson, former UN Human Rights Commissioner, calls on Trudeau to “step up” to address climate change

By
Brent Patterson
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Mary Robinson, a former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, has called on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to “step up” to address climate change at US President Joe Biden’s Climate Leaders Summit this April 22-23.

Robinson now chairs The Elders, a group of independent global leaders working together for peace, justice and human rights that was founded by Nelson Mandela.

She says: “Canada needs to have a sense that it’s not just words at a summit. I’m afraid that Prime Minister Trudeau had good words at recent summits, but they haven’t been followed up by the policies.”

Robinson is encouraging Canada to step up by at least doubling its climate finance contribution from its current $800 million per year and commit to at least a 50 per cent cut in emissions below 2005 levels by 2030.

She adds: “It’s not about criticizing negatively but about encouraging positively, and I positively want to encourage Canada to step up.”

The April 22-23 summit falls just weeks prior to the beginning of three weeks of intensive COP26 climate negotiations from May 31 to June 17.

The COP26 summit itself is scheduled for November 1-12 in Glasgow.

In advance of COP26, PBI-Canada has additionally been calling on Canada to acknowledge that four environmental human rights defenders have been killed every week since the COP21 summit in December 2015.

The UN Human Rights Council has stated: “Environmental human rights defenders must be ensured a safe and enabling environment to undertake their work free from hindrance and insecurity in recognition of their important role in supporting States to fulfil their obligations under the Paris Agreement.”

To send an email directly to the Prime Minister asking him to speak up for environmental defenders, please click here.

CREDHOS at Departmental Assembly of Santander meeting about fracking pilot projects in Puerto Wilches, Colombia

By
Brent Patterson
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The banner says: “Not here, not there, not today, not ever. No to fracking in Colombia”

On April 20, CREDHOS tweeted: “Happening now. The start the decentralized session of the @asambleastder [the Departmental Assembly of Santander] in the municipality of Puerto Wilches. The objective is to discuss the implementation of the fracking pilot projects, their effects and impacts. Social organizations, leaders, entities and authorities of national, departmental and municipal order are involved.”

The livestream of the session can be seen here.

The National Hydrocarbons Agency (ANH) has issued contracts to Ecopetrol and ExxonMobil to conduct fracking pilot projects near Puerto Wilches, Santander in the Magdalena Medio region despite public opposition and human rights concerns.

Webinar on April 29

The Regional Corporation for the Defence of Human Rights (CREDHOS) works closely with the Committee for the Defense of Water, Life and Territory of Puerto Wilches (AguaWil), the Federation of Artisan, Environmental and Tourism Fishermen of Santander (FEDEPESAN), and the Yariguíes Regional Corporation – Social Research Group into Extractives and the Environment in the Magdalena Medio Region (CRY-GEAM).

Click here to join a bilingual webinar on Thursday April 29 at 2:30 pm COT/3:30 pm EDT that will feature environmental defenders from all four organizations speak about their concerns about fracking in the department of Santander.

Ivan Madero (CREDHOS), Yuli Velasquez (FEDEPESAN), Oscar Sampayo (CRY-GEAM), and Yuvelis Natalia Morales (AguaWil).

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