Skip to content

Ecuador

Chris Hedges: How Corporate Tyranny Works

The persecution of the attorney Steven Donziger is a grim illustration of what happens when we confront the real centers of power, masked and unacknowledged by the divisive cant from the Trump White House or the sentimental drivel of the Democratic Party. Those, like Donziger, who name and fight the corporate control of our society on behalf of the vulnerable see the judiciary, the press and the institutions of government unite to crucify them. “It’s been a long battle, 27 years,” Donziger said when I reached him by phone in his apartment in Manhattan.

CLDC Fighting Corporate-Fueled Legal Persecution Of Human Rights Lawyer

For several years now, human rights attorney Steven Donziger has been in the fight of his life and career after Chevron vowed to destroy him for winning a $9.5 billion judgment for indigenous communities in the Ecuadorian Amazon that had been poisoned by the company’s oil drilling. From buying off judges and experts in Ecuador to filing trumped up racketeering charges in the U.S. and getting the inappropriately sympathetic federal judge Kaplan to demand that Mr. Donziger turn over his laptop, cell phone, and attorney-client communications with his extremely vulnerable indigenous clients, Chevron will stop at nothing to evade being held for the life-threatening harm it has caused to tens of thousands of people in the Amazon.

Government Gave Big Oil The Power to Prosecute Its Biggest Critic

In recent years, the American government has given the fossil fuel industry hundreds of billions of dollars of subsidies and opened up wide swaths of public land for drilling. Now, as the climate crisis worsens, a federal judge has given a private corporate law firm with ties to fossil fuel companies the power to criminally prosecute one of the industry’s biggest foes—a lawyer who notched one of history’s biggest legal victories against a major oil company. In 2011, Steven Donziger led the legal team that secured a $9.5 billion judgment against Chevron for polluting the Amazon rainforest in Ecuador. Chevron has not paid that claim, and last year a judge appointed a private law firm to criminally prosecute Donziger for a contempt charge in a countersuit filed by Chevron in federal court in Manhattan. That law firm, Seward & Kissel LLP, has represented Chevron itself as recently as 2018, according to recent court documents. Put another way: The government has taken the extraordinary step of giving prosecutorial power to a law firm that has worked for Chevron—and is allowing that prosecutorial power to be aimed at Chevron’s chief adversary, who has been under house arrest for 332 days.

Ecuador Protests New Neoliberal Measures Amid Lockdown

Unions, students, teachers, workers, and social organizations took to the streets in Quito as others followed from home in several cities Monday with a pot-banging protest. In Quito, Cuenca, and Guayaquil the protesters challenged the restrictions imposed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and took the streets to demand the withdrawal of the measures, and also to defend public education, health, and labor rights. Central Workers' Organization (CUT) President Richard Gomez declared the demonstrators will remain in constant mobilization until their purpose is achieved.

Open Letter In Support Of Environmental Lawyer Steven Donziger

New York - Over 75 organizations, including international legal organizations and major human rights networks, signed on to an open letter released today in support of environmental lawyer Steven Donziger, who has faced nearly unprecedented sanctions from a U.S. federal judge for his pursuit of Chevron for a judgment against the oil giant over its environmental devastation in the Ecuadorian Amazon. The letter identifies the case as “one of the most important corporate accountability and human rights cases of our time.” In 2011, indigenous plaintiffs in the Ecuadorian Amazon received a $19 billion judgment against Chevron for the actions of its predecessor company, Texaco, which spilled over 17 million gallons of crude oil, dumped over 16 billion gallons of toxic wastewater and left hundreds of open pits throughout the Ecuadorian Amazon.

Ecuador Persecutes Opponents As COVID-19 Crisis Exposes Neoliberal War On Public Sector

Up to the end of April, the number of infected and deceased caused by the COVID19 pandemic had spiraled out of control, nearly collapsing the country’s public healthcare sector, already struggling with the cuts and austerity due to the Moreno government’s IMF deal.  The official figures tracking the number of infected finally began demonstrating the more accurate picture of the catastrophe, with the total number of infected and dead reaching 7,161 and 297 on April 10 — an increase of 30 percent within 24 hours. By the end of the month, the official figure for the infected stood at 24,934 infected and around 900 dead.  These numbers have been widely disputed by the citizenry, the international media and the medical staff on the ground, who have reportedly been terrorized and silenced about what they have witnessed.

Bodies In The Streets: IMF Imposed Measures Have Left Ecuador Unable To Cope With Coronavirus

If you are using one of the many coronavirus incidence trackers, the Pacific country of Ecuador does not seem to be particularly badly affected by COVID-19. Officially, the country has less than 7,500 cases and 333 deaths. But everybody knows this number is nonsense, including President Lenín Moreno, who freely admitted that authorities were collecting over 100 dead bodies a day from Guayaquil city alone, the epicenter of the pandemic tormenting his country. Ecuador’s limited state has essentially collapsed under the strain of COVID-19, with dozens of videos circulating showing dead bodies left in the streets, with no one to collect them. The country has already run out of coffins, so corpses are buried in cardboard boxes or simply left in trucking containers.

2019 Latin America In Review: Year Of The Revolt of the Dispossessed

A year ago, John Bolton, Trump’s short-lived national security advisor, invoked the 1823 Monroe Doctrine making explicit what has long been painfully implicit: the dominions south of the Rio Grande are the empire’s “backyard.” Yet 2019 was a year best characterized as the revolt of the dispossessed for a better world against the barbarism of neoliberalism. As Rafael Correa points out, Latin America today is in dispute. What follows is a briefing on this crossroads.

Ecuadorian Opponents Reject Lenin Moreno’s Economic Reform

The Lenin Moreno Administration is moving in two fronts since the mass mobilizations that took place in Ecuador about a month ago. On the one hand, it is criminalizing social protests so opponents can be charged with “rebellion.” This is how they managed to imprison members of Rafael Correa’s political party, Citizen Revolution, as well as leaders of indigenous organizations. Three legislators of this movement requested asylum at Mexico’s Embassy to Ecuador in this connection. On the other hand, the Government is trying to impose economic measures demanded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Days ago, opponents rejected a mega economic reform bill adapted to the markets.

Ecuador: More Uprisings Ahead As Moreno Fails To Listen To The People

Ecuadorean President Lenin Moreno seems to be determined to not listen to the claims being demanded across the country that began only 20 days ago. Revoking Decree 883, which eliminated fuel subsidies, led to a struggle between the Government and indigenous organizations headed by the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE). As this issue is still under political discussion, the Government continues bowing to the dictates of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Crises In Ecuador, Chile, “Reflects The Exhaustion Of Neoliberal Policies”

Several neoliberal or right-wing governments in South America are turning authoritarian in the face of mass protests taking place in their countries, undermining thus the “region’s weak democratic institutionalism,” Spanish political analyst Pascual Serrano told Sputnik. “What is going on in Ecuador, and Chile, which are currently the most visible examples, or in Peru where the Congress was dissolved a few weeks ago, is not an institutional crisis but the exhaustion of neoliberal policies undertaken by right-wing governments, which instead of correcting their mistakes are shifting to authoritarian models”...

Ecuador: After A Blaze Of Protests, A Grey Horizon

During the recent 11-day uprising that shook Ecuador, parts of the capital Quito looked like a battle scene as police drove armed trucks through protest zones and fired tear gas and pepper spray at protesters, many of whom were women and children. The demonstrators wore gas masks laced with vinegar to filter the air, hid behind makeshift shelters and responded by throwing rocks and Molotov bombs. In total, eight people were confirmed killed, 1,340 injured and 1,192 arrested, according to the Ecuadorian Ombudsman.

Whitewashing Neoliberal Repression In Chile And Ecuador

Throughout Latin America and the Caribbean, people are rising up against right-wing, US-backed governments and their neoliberal austerity policies. Currently in Chile, the government of billionaire Sebastian Piñera has deployed the army to crush nationwide demonstrations against inequality sparked by a subway fare hike. In Ecuador, indigenous peoples, workers and students recently brought the country to a standstill during 11 days of protests against the gutting of fuel subsidies by President Lenín Moreno as part of an IMF austerity package.

Revolts Against The Neoliberal World Order

Protests against the US and big finance-imposed neoliberal capitalism have exploded across the globe. Two weeks ago, in Pink Tide Against US Domination Rising Again In Latin America, we reviewed 12 Latin America nations that are rising up against privatization, the cutting of social programs, soaring prices and low wages. In the last week, mass protests in Chile and Bolivia have begun and Lebanon has widespread protests against debt and austerity measures. The Nonaligned Movement, which is critical of the use of illegal unilateral coercive measures by the United States to force countries to bend to its will, is meeting in Azerbaijan. A central part of the recent rise of the Pink Tide was the mass protests in Ecuador led by indigenous peoples and the labor movement.

Ecuadorean President Moreno Accused Of Helping The CIA

Former Foreign Minister of Ecuador Ricardo Patiño has accused President Lenin Moreno of working for the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). “Moreno became a CIA insider due to blackmailing… We are absolutely sure that while Moreno was in Geneva (working as the United Nations Special Envoy on Disability and Accessibility), he established a very close relationship with the CIA and the U.S. Administration because they may have found his secret bank accounts in Panama, opened by his brother to save money from corruption,” Patiño told Sputnik. Deputy Ronny Aleaga, member of the now opponent Citizen Revolution party founded by former president Rafael Correa (2007-2017), filed documents with the Attorney’s Office on Anti-Corruption accusing Moreno of purchasing an apartment by means of bribery during his term as Correa’s vice-president.
assetto corsa mods

Urgent End Of Year Fundraising Campaign

Online donations are back! Keep independent media alive. 

Due to the attacks on our fiscal sponsor, we were unable to raise funds online for nearly two years.  As the bills pile up, your help is needed now to cover the monthly costs of operating Popular Resistance.

Urgent End Of Year Fundraising Campaign

Online donations are back! 

Keep independent media alive. 

Due to the attacks on our fiscal sponsor, we were unable to raise funds online for nearly two years.  As the bills pile up, your help is needed now to cover the monthly costs of operating Popular Resistance.

Sign Up To Our Daily Digest

Independent media outlets are being suppressed and dropped by corporations like Google, Facebook and Twitter. Sign up for our daily email digest before it’s too late so you don’t miss the latest movement news.