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International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples on 9 August 2010Oil Disasters not only at the Gulf of Mexico - Is the Yasuní Initiative an Answer? |
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Press release, 5 August 2010
The biggest oil catastrophe in the world happened with the explosion of the oil rig of BP in the Gulf of Mexico. The entire region - animals and plants as well as fishery and tourism - fights against the consequences. But also other disasters, which release far less oil into the water, contaminate rivers and seas and endanger human being and nature. Especially indigenous peoples are threatened by the oil production in their regions again and again.
So, in Peru in June 2010 crude oil from a tanker flowed into the Río Marañon and poisoned the drinking water source of the surrounding indigenous villages. Also the biggest lake of South America, the Lago de Maracaibo in Venezuela, is strongly polluted through the long lasting intensive oil extraction. Since May 2010 smudgy black oil clumps drift on the water, the fishermen catch always less, mostly oil stuck fish and tourists do not appear any more. This very day, 20 years after the end of the oil production in the northeast of Ecuador oil and heavy metal containing sewages seep from 600 open pits into the groundwater and contaminate livestock pastures and fields.
Now Ecuador introduces an alternative with the Yasuní-ITT initiative: About 900 million barrels of oil that lie under the Yasuní National Park in the block Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputini in the northeast of the country, will not be extracted, if half of the expected revenues will be reimbursed by the international community of states.
Finally on 3 August 2010 the time has come: After three years of preparation the government of Ecuador and the UN Development Programme (UNDP) have signed an official agreement to create the Yasuní-ITT trust fund. That saves 410 billion tons of CO2 in the atmosphere! And at least just as important: The habitat of several indigenous peoples, among others the uncontacted nomadic peoples Tagaeri and Taroemanane, stay intact. The money from the Yasuní fund will be used for the supply with renewable energies and for social projects and
"The Yasuní initiative represents an innovative contribution to the protection of the climate, the rainforest and the human rights. This is a wonderful success of the Ecuadorian civil society and the indigenous organisations of the concerned region, that fight against the destructive oil extraction in the Amazon area for years", appreciates Thomas Brose, manager of Climate Alliance, the signed contract for the trust fund: "The members of Climate Alliance have already asked the EU and its member states in April 2010, to subsidise the Yasuní-ITT proposal of the Ecuadorian government."
On invitation of Climate Alliance in autumn 2010 guests from Ecuador are expected in Europe. On their trip through Luxembourg, Belgium, Germany, Hungary and the Czech Republic in the framework of the EU project "EnergyBridges - sustainable energies for poverty reduction" they will refer about the Yasuní initiative and the current situation in Ecuador.
Further information: --------------- The "Climate Alliance of European Cities with Indigenous Rainforest Peoples" is Europe´s largest city network dedicated to climate protection. Since 1990 it is supporting its more than 1500 members to achieve their commitment, reducing the greenhouse gas emissions by 10 percent every five years, with the important milestone of halving per capita emissions at the latest by 2030 (base year 1990). Climate Alliance cooperates with indigenous peoples for the conservation of the tropical rainforests. Partner is COICA, the coordination of the nine national indigenous organisations in the Amazon basin.
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