Human rights group threatens to sue Chevron
BANGKOK, Thailand (IPS/GIN) — A nonprofit group is warning the U.S. energy giant Chevron to clean up its act in Burma or face legal proceedings, in which the multinational firm’s links to human rights violations could be exposed. There has been little relief for villagers living in the Yadana pipeline region in southern Burma since the Chevron Corp. became a partner to this natural gas venture in 2005, according to a report released April 29 by the Washington-based group EarthRights International.
“Chevron and its consortium partners continue to rely on the Burmese army for pipeline security and those forces continue to conscript thousands of villagers for forced labor, and to commit torture, rape, murder and other serious abuses in the course of their operations,” said the 76-page report, “The Human Cost of Energy.”
Chevron should act on “its moral and legal obligations to human rights rather than profit from human rights abuses,” the report added about this project, which earned Burma’s junta about $1.1 billion in 2006, over half of its total earnings from the sale of gas to neighboring Thailand, which was $2.16 billion that year.
“Chevron can be sued by villagers from Burma if it does not stop the human rights violations,” said Naing Htoo, EarthRights International’s Burma Project coordinator, speaking during a press conference at the launch of the report. “The violations are happening every day.”
“Chevron is aiding and abetting the pattern of abuse that is going on,” added Katie Redford, U.S. director of EarthRights International. “Chevron is liable for the forced labor. They are liable for the torture and rape the [Burmese] security forces are committing in the furtherance of the contract.”
EarthRights International’s report comes at a time when Chevron has been trying to gain a positive image as a responsible corporate citizen committed to helping the world achieve its energy needs in a cleaner manner. Its slick television and newspaper campaign was launched last September in the U.S. One report put Chevron’s “green marketing campaign” at $15 million.
Chevron has been trying to distance itself from the reports of human rights violations in the pipeline region of Burma, Redford said. Total, Chevron’s French partner in the Yadana project, is facing similar criticisms but has opted to accept some of the accusations in southern Burma.
The main abusers are the Burmese military battalions assigned to protect the pipeline, Naing Htoo said in an interview. “The soldiers confiscate the lands owned by the villagers and force them to grow rice. They also force the villagers to carry military supplies for the camp and have other forms of forced labor. Then there is rape and torture.”
Two light infantry battalions, a total of 600 soldiers, have been given the duty “to handle security for the pipeline,” he said. But 14 battalions are operating in the area, making it one of Burma’s more heavily militarized parts.
The Yadana pipeline has been dogged by controversy since its inception in 1991. This venture, to extract offshore natural gas in the Andaman Sea and have it flow along an overland pipe to Thailand, was backed by a consortium that included the U.S. company Unocal, the French company Total, and a subsidiary of Thailand’s state-owned gas and oil company. The local partner was the Myanmar Gas and Oil Enterprise, an affiliate of Burma’s energy ministry.
The mounting human rights violations at the time were documented by EarthRights International, resulting in the latter’s first report, “Total Denial,” in 1996. Subsequently, several victims of the Yadana project, assisted by EarthRights International and a team of lawyers, filed a lawsuit in a U.S. federal court against Unocal, accusing it of “complicity in their injuries.” Nine years later, in March 2005, the Burmese victims were victorious, when Unocal decided to settle this lengthy legal battle and compensate the villagers, a major milestone in international human rights law.
“The case came to be the big test case in terms of corporate responsibility, because ’til then there was uncertainty over how the courts will handle cases of companies linked to human rights violations in a foreign country,” said Doug Sanders, a retired Canadian law professor on the visiting faculty of Bangkok’s Chulalongkorn University. “Traditionally, international human rights law applied to only countries, not individuals or companies.”
That result has “opened the way for big companies who fail to meet their corporate social responsibilities in foreign countries to feel the heat in court,” Sanders said in an interview. “It affirmed that corporations have to bear certain responsibilities under human rights law that can be enforced in local courts.”
—Marwaan Macan-Markar
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.